Workshop « 2Dto3D Ocean Dynamics from Space »

This workshop discussed the potential of existing and future high-resolution satellite data in order to retrieve not only surface horizontal motions but also part of the 3D dynamics (including the vertical velocity field) in surface layers. The emphasis was, among other approaches, on methods based on principles of potential vorticity conservation. The workshop gathered about 35 scientists, postdocs and PhD students, and addressed these topics throughout four sessions.

• The first one examined promising synergies between high-resolution ocean color, SST images and SSH data. The use of in-situ data (such as those from the Argo float database) in order to complement these synergies was also discussed. In that context first attempts of reconstruction of 3D dynamics using synthetic fields were presented.

• The second session focused on the use of stochastic strategies in order to retrieve fine oceanic scales from larger ones. One common goal between the three different strategies presented is to better estimate contributions of fine scales to heat and momentum fluxes.
• The third session dealt with deterministic methods, which again aim at estimating oceanic fine scales from larger ones. The methods presented in the first two talks involve both Lagrangian and Eulerian techniques and rely on the existence of direct potential vorticity cascade. The last talk described a spectral method to reconstruct the fine scales associated with specific large gradients present in low resolution data fields.
• The last session focused on existing 3D in-situ data of submesoscales (including biogeochemical data) and their relationship with the deformation field estimated from satellite data. First attempts to recover the 3D field from the surface information were presented.

For more information on this workshop, please contact:

Patrice Klein (LPO/Ifremer) and/or Bertrand Chapron (LOS/Ifremer)

Following the workshop, Jeroen Molemaker gave a conference on « Submesoscale flows in the oceanic surface layers ». This conference opened the LabexMer Lecture Series.

Talks given in the different sessions can be downloaded here