North Atlantic Gyre

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View of the currents surrounding the gyre. North Atlantic Gyre.png
View of the currents surrounding the gyre.

The North Atlantic Gyre of the Atlantic Ocean is one of five great oceanic gyres. It is a circular ocean current, with offshoot eddies and sub-gyres, across the North Atlantic from the Intertropical Convergence Zone (calms or doldrums) to the part south of Iceland, and from the east coasts of North America to the west coasts of Europe and Africa.

Contents

In turn it is chiefly subdivided into the Gulf Stream flowing northward along the west; its often conflated continuation, the North Atlantic Current across the north; the Canary Current flowing southward along the east; and the Atlantic's North Equatorial Current in the south. The gyre has a pronounced thermohaline circulation, bringing salty water west from the Mediterranean Sea and then north to form the North Atlantic Deep Water.

The gyre traps anthropogenic (human-made) marine debris in its natural garbage or flotsam patch, in the same way the North Pacific Gyre has the Great Pacific garbage patch. [1]

At the heart of the gyre is the Sargasso Sea, noted for its still waters and quite dense seaweed accumulations.

Structure

Low air temperatures at high latitudes cause substantial sea-air heat flux, driving a density increase and convection in the water column. Open ocean convection occurs in deep plumes and is particularly strong in winter when the sea-air temperature difference is largest. [2] Of the 6 sverdrup (Sv) of dense water that flows southward over the GSR (Greenland-Scotland Ridge), 3 Sv does so via the Denmark Strait forming Denmark Strait Overflow Water (DSOW). 0.5-1 Sv flows over the Iceland-Faroe ridge and the remaining 2–2.5 Sv returns through the Faroe-Shetland Channel; these two flows form Iceland Scotland Overflow Water (ISOW). The majority of flow over the Faroe-Shetland ridge flows through the Faroe-Bank Channel and soon joins that which flowed over the Iceland-Faroe ridge, to flow southward at depth along the Eastern flank of the Reykjanes Ridge.

As ISOW overflows the GSR (Greenland-Scotland Ridge), it turbulently entrains intermediate density waters such as Sub-Polar Mode water and Labrador Sea Water. This grouping of water-masses then moves geostrophically southward along the East flank of Reykjanes Ridge, through the Charlie Gibbs Fracture Zone and then northward to join DSOW. These waters are sometimes referred to as Nordic Seas Overflow Water (NSOW). NSOW flows cyclonically following the surface route of the SPG (sub-polar gyre) around the Labrador Sea and further entrains Labrador Sea Water (LSW). [3]

Characteristically fresh Labrador Sea Water (LSW) is formed at intermediate depths by deep convection in the central Labrador Sea, particularly during winter storms. [2] This convection is not deep enough to penetrate into the NSOW layer which forms the deep waters of the Labrador Sea. LSW joins NSOW to move southward out of the Labrador Sea: while NSOW easily passes under the NAC at the North-West Corner, some LSW is retained. This diversion and retention by the SPG explains its presence and entrainment near the GSR (Greenland-Scotland Ridge) overflows. Most of the diverted LSW however splits off before the CGFZ (Charlie-Gibbs Fracture Zone) and remains in the western SPG. LSW production is highly dependent on sea-air heat flux and yearly production typically ranges from 3–9 Sv. [4] [5] ISOW is produced in proportion to the density gradient across the Iceland-Scotland Ridge and as such is sensitive to LSW production which affects the downstream density [6] [7] More indirectly, increased LSW production is associated with a strengthened SPG and hypothesized to be anti-correlated with ISOW [8] [9] [10] This interplay confounds any simple extension of a reduction in individual overflow waters to a reduction in AMOC. LSW production is understood to have been minimal prior to the 8.2 ka event, [11] with the SPG thought to have existed before in a weakened, non-convective state. [12]

There is a debate about the extent to which convection in the Labrador Sea plays a role in AMOC circulation, particularly in the connection between Labrador sea variability and AMOC variability. [13] Observational studies have been inconclusive about whether this connection exists. [14] New observations with the OSNAP array show little contribution from the Labrador Sea to overturning, and hydrographic observations from ships dating back to 1990 show similar results. [15] [16] Nevertheless, older estimates of LSW formation using different techniques suggest larger overturning. [17]

Seasonal variability

As with many oceanographic patterns, the North Atlantic Gyre experiences seasonal changes. [18] Stramma and Siedler (1988) determined that the gyre expands and contracts with a seasonal variance; however, the magnitude of volume transport does not seem to change significantly. During the Northern Hemisphere winter season, the gyre follows a more zonal pattern; that is, it expands in the east-west direction and thins in the north-south direction. As the seasons move from winter to summer, the gyre shifts south by a few degrees latitude. This occurs concurrently with the displacement of the northeastern part of the gyre. It has been concluded that zonal deviations within the gyre remain small while north and south of the gyre they are large. [19]

Data collected in the Sargasso Sea region in the western part of the North Atlantic Gyre has led to analytical evidence that the variability of this gyre is linked to wintertime convective mixing. According to Bates (2001), a seasonal variation of 8-10 °C in surface temperature occurs alongside a fluctuation in the mixed layer depth between the Northern Hemisphere winter and summer seasons. The depth rises from 200 meters in winter to about 10 meters in summer. Nutrients remain below the euphotic zone for most of the year, resulting in low primary production. Yet during winter convective mixing, nutrients penetrate the euphotic zone, causing a short-lived phytoplankton bloom in the spring. This then lifts the mixed-layer depth to 10 meters.

The changes in oceanic biology and vertical mixing between winter and summer in the North Atlantic Gyre seasonally alter the total amount of carbon dioxide in the seawater. Interannual trends have established that carbon dioxide concentrations within this gyre are increasing at a similar rate to that occurring in the atmosphere. This discovery concurs with that made in the North Pacific Gyre. The North Atlantic Gyre also undergoes temperature changes via atmospheric wave patterns. The North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) is one such pattern. During its positive phase, the gyre warms. This is due to a weakening of the westerly winds, resulting in reduced wind stress and heat exchange, providing a greater period of time for the gyre water temperatures to rise. [20]

Lead contamination

Measured samples of aerosols, marine particles, and water in the gyre from 199092 include examining lead isotope ratios. Certain isotopes are hallmarks of pollution essentially from Europe and the near Middle East by trade winds; other contamination was primarily caused by American emissions. The surface layers of the Sargasso Sea were read for such concentrations. 4257% of the contamination came from American industrial and automotive sources, despite the reduction in the production and use of leaded gasoline in the United States. Since 1992 lead has clearly reducing concentrations this is theorised to hold true across the Atlantic in surface layers. [21]

Garbage patch

The North Atlantic Gyre is one of five major ocean gyres. North Atlantic Gyre location.png
The North Atlantic Gyre is one of five major ocean gyres.
The North Atlantic garbage patch is a garbage patch of man-made marine debris found floating within the North Atlantic Gyre, originally documented in 1972. [22] A 22-year research study conducted by the Sea Education Association estimates the patch to be hundreds of kilometers across, with a density of more than 200,000 pieces of debris per square kilometer. [23] [24] [25] [26] The garbage originates from human-created waste traveling from rivers into the ocean and mainly consists of microplastics. [27] The garbage patch is a large risk to wildlife (and to humans) through plastic consumption and entanglement. [28] There have only been a few awareness and clean-up efforts for the North Atlantic garbage patch, such as The Garbage Patch State at UNESCO and The Ocean Cleanup, as most of the research and cleanup efforts have been focused on the Great Pacific garbage patch, a similar garbage patch in the north Pacific. [29] [30]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Atlantic Ocean</span> Ocean between Europe, Africa and the Americas

The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's five oceans, with an area of about 85,133,000 km2 (32,870,000 sq mi). It covers approximately 17% of Earth's surface and about 24% of its water surface area. During the Age of Discovery, it was known for separating the Old World of Africa, Europe, and Asia from the New World of the Americas.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">North Atlantic Current</span> Current of the Atlantic Ocean

The North Atlantic Current (NAC), also known as North Atlantic Drift and North Atlantic Sea Movement, is a powerful warm western boundary current within the Atlantic Ocean that extends the Gulf Stream northeastward.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">North Atlantic Deep Water</span> Deep water mass formed in the North Atlantic Ocean

North Atlantic Deep Water (NADW) is a deep water mass formed in the North Atlantic Ocean. Thermohaline circulation of the world's oceans involves the flow of warm surface waters from the southern hemisphere into the North Atlantic. Water flowing northward becomes modified through evaporation and mixing with other water masses, leading to increased salinity. When this water reaches the North Atlantic, it cools and sinks through convection, due to its decreased temperature and increased salinity resulting in increased density. NADW is the outflow of this thick deep layer, which can be detected by its high salinity, high oxygen content, nutrient minima, high 14C/12C, and chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ocean gyre</span> Any large system of circulating ocean surface currents

In oceanography, a gyre is any large system of circulating ocean surface currents, particularly those involved with large wind movements. Gyres are caused by the Coriolis effect; planetary vorticity, horizontal friction and vertical friction determine the circulatory patterns from the wind stress curl (torque).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">East Greenland Current</span> Current from Fram Strait to Cape Farewell off the eastern coat of Greenland

The East Greenland Current (EGC) is a cold, low-salinity current that extends from Fram Strait (~80N) to Cape Farewell (~60N). The current is located off the eastern coast of Greenland along the Greenland continental margin. The current cuts through the Nordic Seas and through the Denmark Strait. The current is of major importance because it directly connects the Arctic to the Northern Atlantic, it is a major contributor to sea ice export out of the Arctic, and it is a major freshwater sink for the Arctic.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Labrador Current</span> Cold current in the Atlantic ocean along the coasts of Labrador, Newfoundland and Nova Scotia

The Labrador Current is a cold current in the North Atlantic Ocean which flows from the Arctic Ocean south along the coast of Labrador and passes around Newfoundland, continuing south along the east coast of Canada near Nova Scotia. Near Nova Scotia, this cold water current meets the warm northward moving Gulf Stream. The combination of these two currents produces heavy fogs and has also created one of the richest fishing grounds in the world.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">North Pacific Gyre</span> Major circulating system of ocean currents

The North Pacific Gyre (NPG) or North Pacific Subtropical Gyre (NPSG), located in the northern Pacific Ocean, is one of the five major oceanic gyres. This gyre covers most of the northern Pacific Ocean. It is the largest ecosystem on Earth, located between the equator and 50° N latitude, and comprising 20 million square kilometers. The gyre has a clockwise circular pattern and is formed by four prevailing ocean currents: the North Pacific Current to the north, the California Current to the east, the North Equatorial Current to the south, and the Kuroshio Current to the west. It is the site of an unusually intense collection of human-created marine debris, known as the Great Pacific Garbage Patch.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Great Pacific garbage patch</span> Gyre of debris in the North Pacific

The Great Pacific garbage patch is a garbage patch, a gyre of marine debris particles, in the central North Pacific Ocean. It is located roughly from 135°W to 155°W and 35°N to 42°N. The collection of plastic and floating trash originates from the Pacific Rim, including countries in Asia, North America, and South America.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Atlantic meridional overturning circulation</span> System of surface and deep currents in the Atlantic Ocean

The Atlantic meridional overturning circulation (AMOC) is the "main current system in the South and North Atlantic Oceans". As such, it is a component of Earth's oceanic circulation system and plays an important role in the climate system. The AMOC includes currents at the surface as well as at great depths in the Atlantic Ocean. These currents are driven by changes in the atmospheric weather as well as by changes in temperature and salinity. They collectively make up one half of the global thermohaline circulation that encompasses the flow of major ocean currents. The other half is the Southern Ocean overturning circulation.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ross Gyre</span> Circulating system of ocean currents in the Ross Sea

The Ross Gyre is one of three gyres that exists within the Southern Ocean around Antarctica, the others being the Weddell Gyre and Balleny Gyre. The Ross Gyre is located north of the Ross Sea, and rotates clockwise. The gyre is formed by interactions between the Antarctic Circumpolar Current and the Antarctic Continental Shelf. The Ross Gyre is bounded by the Polar Front of the Antarctic Circumpolar Current to the north, the Antarctic Slope Current to the south, the Balleny Gyre to the west, and a variable boundary to the east from semiannual changes in sea surface height (SSH) in the Amundsen Sea. Circulation in the Ross Gyre has been estimated to be 20 ± 5 Sverdrup (Sv) and plays a large role in heat exchange in this region.

The Southern Pacific Gyre is part of the Earth's system of rotating ocean currents, bounded by the Equator to the north, Australia to the west, the Antarctic Circumpolar Current to the south, and South America to the east. The center of the South Pacific Gyre is the oceanic pole of inaccessibility, the site on Earth farthest from any continents and productive ocean regions and is regarded as Earth's largest oceanic desert. With an area of 37 million square kilometres it makes up ~10 % of the Earth's ocean surface. The gyre, as with Earth's other four gyres, contains an area with elevated concentrations of pelagic plastics, chemical sludge, and other debris known as the South Pacific garbage patch.

The Great Salinity Anomaly (GSA) originally referred to an event in the late 1960s to early 1970s where a large influx of freshwater from the Arctic Ocean led to a salinity anomaly in the northern North Atlantic Ocean, which affected the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation. Since then, the term "Great Salinity Anomaly" has been applied to successive occurrences of the same phenomenon, including the Great Salinity Anomaly of the 1980s and the Great Salinity Anomaly of the 1990s. The Great Salinity Anomalies were advective events, propagating to different sea basins and areas of the North Atlantic, and is on the decadal-scale for the anomalies in the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mode water</span> Type of water mass which is nearly vertically homogeneous

Mode water is defined as a particular type of water mass, which is nearly vertically homogeneous. Its vertical homogeneity is caused by the deep vertical convection in winter. The first term to describe this phenomenon is 18° water, which was used by Valentine Worthington to describe the isothermal layer in the northern Sargasso Sea cooling to a temperature of about 18 °C each winter. Then Masuzawa introduced the subtropical mode water concept to describe the thick layer of temperature 16–18 °C in the northwestern North Pacific subtropical gyre, on the southern side of the Kuroshio Extension. The terminology mode water was extended to the thick near-surface layer north of the Subantarctic Front by McCartney, who identified and mapped the properties of the Subantarctic mode water (SAMW). After that, McCartney and Talley then applied the term subpolar mode water (SPMW) to the thick near-surface mixed layers in the North Atlantic’s subpolar gyre.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Labrador Sea Water</span> Water mass formed by convective processes in the Labrador Sea

Labrador Sea Water is an intermediate water mass characterized by cold water, relatively low salinity compared to other intermediate water masses, and high concentrations of both oxygen and anthropogenic tracers. It is formed by convective processes in the Labrador Sea located between Greenland and the northeast coast of the Labrador Peninsula. Deep convection in the Labrador Sea allows colder water to sink forming this water mass, which is a contributor to the upper layer of North Atlantic Deep Water. North Atlantic Deep Water flowing southward is integral to the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation. The Labrador Sea experiences a net heat loss to the atmosphere annually.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nordic Seas</span>

The Nordic Seas are located north of Iceland and south of Svalbard. They have also been defined as the region located north of the Greenland-Scotland Ridge and south of the Fram Strait-Spitsbergen-Norway intersection. Known to connect the North Pacific and the North Atlantic waters, this region is also known as having some of the densest waters, creating the densest region found in the North Atlantic Deep Water. The deepest waters of the Arctic Ocean are connected to the worlds other oceans through Nordic Seas and Fram Strait. There are three seas within the Nordic Sea: Greenland Sea, Norwegian Sea, and Iceland Sea. The Nordic Seas only make up about 0.75% of the World's Oceans. This region is known as having diverse features in such a small topographic area, such as the mid oceanic ridge systems. Some locations have shallow shelves, while others have deep slopes and basins. This region, because of the atmosphere-ocean transfer of energy and gases, has varying seasonal climate. During the winter, sea ice is formed in the western and northern regions of the Nordic Seas, whereas during the summer months, the majority of the region remains free of ice.

Open ocean convection is a process in which the mesoscale ocean circulation and large, strong winds mix layers of water at different depths. Fresher water lying over the saltier or warmer over the colder leads to the stratification of water, or its separation into layers. Strong winds cause evaporation, so the ocean surface cools, weakening the stratification. As a result, the surface waters are overturned and sink while the "warmer" waters rise to the surface, starting the process of convection. This process has a crucial role in the formation of both bottom and intermediate water and in the large-scale thermohaline circulation, which largely determines global climate. It is also an important phenomena that controls the intensity of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC).

Delia Wanda Oppo is an American scientist who works on paleoceanography where she focuses on past variations in water circulation and the subsequent impact on Earth's climate system. She was elected a fellow of the American Geophysical Union in 2014.

Low-nutrient, low-chlorophyll (LNLC)regions are aquatic zones that are low in nutrients and consequently have low rate of primary production, as indicated by low chlorophyll concentrations. These regions can be described as oligotrophic, and about 75% of the world's oceans encompass LNLC regions. A majority of LNLC regions are associated with subtropical gyres but are also present in areas of the Mediterranean Sea, and some inland lakes. Physical processes limit nutrient availability in LNLC regions, which favors nutrient recycling in the photic zone and selects for smaller phytoplankton species. LNLC regions are generally not found near coasts, owing to the fact that coastal areas receive more nutrients from terrestrial sources and upwelling. In marine systems, seasonal and decadal variability of primary productivity in LNLC regions is driven in part by large-scale climatic regimes leading to important effects on the global carbon cycle and the oceanic carbon cycle.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Faroe-Bank Channel overflow</span> Overflow current from Nordic Seas towards North Atlantic Ocean

Cold and dense water from the Nordic Seas is transported southwards as Faroe-Bank Channel overflow. This water flows from the Arctic Ocean into the North Atlantic through the Faroe-Bank Channel between the Faroe Islands and Scotland. The overflow transport is estimated to contribute to one-third of the total overflow over the Greenland-Scotland Ridge. The remaining two-third of overflow water passes through Denmark Strait, the Wyville Thomson Ridge (0.3 Sv), and the Iceland-Faroe Ridge (1.1 Sv).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Irminger Rings</span> Ocean eddies in Labrador Sea which influence deep convection

Irminger Rings (IRs) are mesoscale ocean eddies that are formed off the West coast of Greenland and travel southwestwards through the Labrador Sea. Most IRs are anti-cyclonic. There is considerable interest in researching IRs, because they have been hypothesized to influence deep convection in the Labrador sea, and therefore the formation of deep water.

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