Abrupt climate changes: How freshening of the northern Atlantic affects the thermohaline and wind-driven oceanic circulations

Annual Review of Earth and Planetary Sciences

Volumn 36, Issue , 2008, Pages 33-58

  Barreiro, Marcelo ^a   Fedorov, Alexey ^b   Pacanowski, Ronald ^a   Philander, S George ^a  

^a PRINCETON UNIVERSITY   (United States)

^b YALE UNIVERSITY   (United States)

Author keywords

Extratropical tropical connections; Heat transport; Ocean general circulation; Ocean thermal structure; Paleoclimates

Indexed keywords

(1 1 0) SURFACE; ATLANTIC; CLIMATE MODELLING; DIFFUSIVE PROCESSES; NORTH ATLANTIC (NA); OCEAN RESPONSE; OCEANIC CIRCULATIONS; PALEOCLIMATES;

CLIMATE CONTROL; CLIMATOLOGY; SURFACE WATERS; TESTING;

CLIMATE CHANGE;

CLIMATE CHANGE; CLIMATE MODELING; GENERAL CIRCULATION MODEL; HEAT TRANSFER; HYDROLOGICAL RESPONSE; MODEL TEST; PALEOCLIMATE; SURFACE WATER; THERMAL STRUCTURE; THERMOHALINE CIRCULATION; WIND-DRIVEN CIRCULATION;

ATLANTIC OCEAN; ATLANTIC OCEAN (NORTH);

EID: 45849140494     PISSN: 00846597     EISSN: None     Source Type: Book Series    
DOI: 10.1146/annurev.earth.36.090507.143219     Document Type: Article

References (51)

1. Alley RB, Marotzke J, Nordhaus WD, OverpeckJT, Peteet DM, et al. 2003. Abrupt climate change. Science 299:2005-10
2. Barreiro M, Chang P, Ji L, Saravanan R, Giannini A. 2005. Dynamical elements of predicting boreal spring tropical Atlantic sea-surface temperatures. Dyn. Atmos. Ocean 39:61-86
3. Boccaletti G. 2005. Timescales and dynamics of the formation of a thermocline. Dyn. Atmos. Oceans 39:21-40
4. Boccaletti G, Ferrari R, Ferreira D, Adcroft A, Marshall J. 2005. The vertical structure of the oceanic heat transport. Geophys. Res. Lett. 32:L10603
5. Boccaletti G, Pacanowski R, Philander SGH, Fedorov A. 2004. The thermal structure of the upper ocean. J. Phys. Oceanogr. 34:888-902
6. Broecker WS. 1990. Salinity history of the Northern Atlantic during the last deglaciation. Paleoceanography 5:459-67
7. Bryden HL, Longworth HR, Cunningham SA. 2005. Slowing of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation at 25°N. Nature 438:655-57
8. Cessi P, Bryan K, Zhang R. 2004. Global seiching of thermocline waters between the Atlantic and the Indian-Pacific ocean basins. Geophys. Res. Lett. 31:L04302
9. Chiang JCH, Bitz C. 2005. Influence of high latitude ice cover on the marine intertropical convergence zone. Clim. Dyn. 25(5):477-96
10. Clarke G, Leverington D, Teller J, Dyke A. 2003. Superlakes, megafloods and abrupt climate change. Science 301:922-23
11. Curry R, Mauritzen C. 2005. Dilution of the northern North Atlantic ocean in recent decades. Science 308:1772-74
12. Dansgaard W, Johnsen SJ, Clausen HB, Dahl-Jensen D, Gundestrup NS, et al. 1993. Evidence for general instability of past climate from a 250-kyr ice core record. Nature 364:218-20
13. Delworth T, Broccoli AJ, Rosati A, Stouffer RJ, Balaji V, et al. 2006. GFDL's CM2 global coupled climate models. Part 1: Formulation and simulation characteristics. J. Clim. 19:643-74
14. Dickson B, Yashayaev I, Meincke J, Turrell B, Dye S, Holfort J. 2002. Rapid freshening of the deep North Atlantic ocean over the past four decades. Nature 416:832-37
15. Dickson RR, Meincke J, Malmberg SA, Lee AJ. 1988. The "great salinity anomaly" in the northern North Atlantic 1968-1982. Prog. Oceanogr. 20:103-51
16. Ekstrom G, Nettles M, Tsai VC. 2006. Seasonality and increasing frequency of Greenland glacial earthquakes. Science 311:1756-58
17. EPICA Community Members. 2006. One-to-one coupling of glacial climate variability in Greenland and Antarctica. Nature 444:195-98
18. Fedorov A, Barreiro M, Boccaletti G, Pacanowski R, Philander SGH. 2007. The freshening of surface waters in high latitudes: Effects on the thermohaline and wind-driven circulations. J. Phys. Oceanogr. 37:896-907
19. Fedorov AV, Dekens PS, McCarthy M, Ravelo AC, Barreiro M, et al. 2006. The Pliocene paradox. Science 312:1485-89
20. Fedorov AV, Pacanowski RC, Philander SGH, Boccaletti G. 2004. The effect of salinity on the wind-driven circulation and the thermal structure of the upper ocean. J. Phys. Oceanogr. 34:1949-66
21. Gnanadesikan A, Dixon KW, Griffies SM, Balaji V, Barreiro M, et al. 2006. GFDL's CM2 global coupled climate models. Part 2: The baseline ocean simulation. J. Climate 19:675-97
22. Goose H, Fichefet T. 1999. Importance of ice-ocean interaction for the global ocean circulation: a model study. J. Geophys. Res. 104:23337-55
23. GregoryJM, Dixon KW, Stouffer RJ, Weaver AJ, Driesschaert E, et al. 2005. A model intercomparison to changes in the Atlantic thermohaline circulation in response to increasing atmospheric CO2 concentration. Geophys. Res. Lett. 32:L12703, doi:10.1029/2005GL023209
24. Hall A, Stouffer RJ. 2001. An abrupt climate event in a coupled ocean-atmosphere simulation without external forcing. Nature 409:171-74
25. Johnson HL, Marshall DP. 2002. A theory for the surface Atlantic response to thermohaline variability. J. Phys. Oceanogr. 32:1121-32
26. Knutti R, Flueckiger J, Stocker TF, Timmermann A. 2004. Strong hemispheric coupling of glacial climate through freshwater discharge and ocean circulation. Nature 430:851-56
27. Ledwell JR, Montgomery ET, Polzin KL, St. Laurent LC, Schmitt RW, Toole JM. 2000. Evidence for enhanced mixing over rough topography in the abyssal ocean. Nature 403:179-82
28. Ledwell JR, Watson AJ, Law C. 1993. Evidence for slow mixing across the pycnocline from an open-ocean tracer-release experiment. Nature 364:701-3
29. Manabe S, Stouffer RJ. 1995. Simulation of abrupt climate change induced by fresh-water input to the North Atlantic ocean. Nature 378:165-67
30. Manabe S, Stouffer RJ. 1999. The role of thermohaline circulation in climate. Tellus A 51(1):91-109
31. Opsteegh JD, Haarsma RJ, Selten FM, Kattenberg A. 1998. ECBILT: a dynamic alternative to mixed boundary conditions in ocean models. Tellus A 50:348-67
32. PedloskyJ. 2004. Ocean Circulation Theory. Berlin: Springer Verlag. 453 pp.
33. Quadfasel D. 2005. The Atlantic heat conveyor slows. Nature 438:565-66
34. Rahmstorf S. 1995. Bifurcation of the Atlantic thermohaline circulation in response to changes in the hydrological cycle. Nature 378:145-49
35. Rahmstorf S. 2002. Ocean circulation and climate during the past 120000 years. Nature 432:379-82
36. Rahmstorf S. 2006. Thermohaline ocean circulation. In Encyclopedia of Quaternary Sciences, ed. Elias SA. Amsterdam: Elsevier
37. Rind D, deMenocal P, Russell G, Sheth S, Collins D, Schmidt G, Teller J. 2001. Effects of glacial meltwater in the GISS coupled atmosphere-ocean model. 1. North Atlantic deep water response. J. Geophys. Res. 106:27335-53
38. Samelson R, Vallis GK. 1997. Large-scale circulation with small diapycnal diffusivity: the two-thermocline limit. J. Mar. Res. 55:1-54
39. Seidov D, Maslin M. 2001. Atlantic Ocean heat piracy and the bipolar climate see-saw during Heinrich and Dansgaard-Oeschger events. J. Quat. Sci. 16:321-28
40. Stouffer RJ, Yin J, Gregory JM, Dixon KW, Spelman MJ, et al. 2006. Investigating the causes of the response of the thermohaline circulation to past and future climate changes. J. Clim. 19:698-722
41. Talley LD. 2003. Shallow, intermediate and deep overturning components of the global heat budget. J. Phys. Oceanogr. 33:530-60
42. Toggweiler JR, Samuels B. 1993. Is the magnitude of the deep outflow from the Atlantic Ocean actually governed by Southern Hemisphere winds? In The Global Carbon Cycle, pp. 303-31. Berlin: Springer-Verlag
43. Toggweiler JR, Samuels B. 1995. Effect of Drake Passage on the global thermohaline circulation. Deep-Sea Res. I 42(4):477-500
44. Tziperman E. 1986. On the role of interior mixing and air-sea fluxes in determining the stratification and circulation of the oceans. J. Phys. Oceanogr. 16:680-93
45. Vallis GK. 2006. Atmospheric and Oceanic Fluid Dynamics: Fundamentals and Large-Scale Circulation. Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press. 745 pp.
46. Vellinga M, Woods RA. 2002. Global climatic impacts of a collapse of the Atlantic thermohaline circulation, Clim. Change 54:251-267
47. Wunsch C. 2002. What is the thermohaline circulation? Science 298:1179-80
48. Wunsch C. 2006. Abrupt climate change: an alternative view. Quartenary Res. 65:191-203
49. Yang J. 1999. A linkage between decadal climate variations in the Labrador Sea and the tropical Atlantic ocean. Geophys. Res. Lett. 26:1023-26
50. Zhang R, Delworth T. 2005. Simulated tropical response to a substantial weakening of the Atlantic thermohaline circulation. J. Clim. 18:1853-60
51. Zhang J, Schmitt RW, Huang RX. 1999. The relative influence of diapycnal mixing and hydrologic forcing on the stability of the thermohaline circulation. J. Phys. Oceanogr. 29:1096-108