Program
- Program
- Association Symposia
This symposium welcomes presentations of new research results in physical and biogeochemical oceanography not included in the other symposia. It explores oceanic processes of global relevance and those specific to different regions of the ocean, such as tropical, subtropical, subpolar, polar, marginal, and coastal seas. Relevant processes include water mass formation and interactions, large-scale and meso-scale circulations, interactions with other Earth system components (land, seafloor, atmosphere, and cryosphere), distribution and cycling of chemical elements and compounds, or pollution. Variability on different space and time scales will be considered and methodological approaches will range from in situ, autonomous, and satellite observations to numerical and laboratory studies.
This interdisciplinary symposium provides a joint forum for oceanographers whose research focuses on physical, chemical and biological processes in coastal zones, semi-enclosed and shelf seas of the World as well as their response to climate change and anthropogenic impacts. These areas are often characterized by complex interactions between land, ocean and atmosphere, they exhibit rich dynamics driven by a variety of feedbacks and forcing mechanisms. Marginal seas and coastal areas are particularly vulnerable to climate change effects and anthropogenic stressors. Given their limited geographical extension and their sometimes constricted connection to the open ocean, these environments often exhibit shorter timescales in their responses to external forcing: this is why they are widely recognized as natural "laboratories" for studying oceanic processes and interactions between the physical, biogeochemical and climatic spheres. They also play an exceptionally important role in ecosystem services and socio-economic issues and require careful governance measures to avoid or mitigate environmental deterioration. Gathering experts from different regions, the symposium will give a global perspective of the topic through comparison and elucidation of similarities and differences. Contributions on different regions are invited, related to themes such as innovative observational, theoretical, experimental and modelling studies of the hydrodynamics, marine biochemistry (e.g. nutrient dynamics, primary production, acidification, algae blooms) and the influence these regional seas and coastal zones exert on the adjacent basins/oceans and on the global scale. Studies of past, present and future climate variability are welcome, as well as interdisciplinary studies on the bio-physical interactions in the semi-enclosed and shelf seas.
Extreme sea levels (excluding tsunamis) emerge as a combination of regional mean sea level, astronomic tides, storm surges caused by extra-tropical or tropical storms, a dynamic wave component leading to wave-set up and runup, and, in detas and estuaries, river discharge. Resulting flooding events can have devastting impacts with wide ranging social, economic and environmental consequenses. In order to plan effective adaptation to coastal flooding hazards it is essential to improve the understanding of the superposition of the extreme sea level components, and how they are modulated by climate change and variability, individually and in combination. This symposium seeks contributions that have: (i) examined changes in extreme sea levels and waves including the role of climate change and variability (past and future); (ii) undertaken statistical or process-based amodel analyses of extreme water levels or its indivisual components; (iii) assesses the various types of impacts (e.g. inundation, ersion, ecosystem degradation; (iv) or taken an integrated approach toward flood hazard and vulnerability evaluation of coastal complex systems as a result of extreme sea levels.
Encompassing the largest ocean currents in the circumpolar mixing engine of the Southern Ocean to the narrow gaps of throughflows and overflows from Indonesia to Iceland, the meridional overturning circulation (MOC) is a system of currents that links the world’s oceans. With its global reach from surface to abyss, the MOC substantially influences the Earth’s cycles of heat, freshwater, and carbon.
Global climate models have projected a decline in Atlantic MOC strength in response to anthropogenic climate change since dynamic oceans were first included in the 1980s—a projection that remains to this day. However, complex global climate models rarely simulate collapses in MOC strength associated with passing tipping points, unlike more idealized models. Is MOC collapse a risk that has been overlooked?
MOC dynamics and variability link to key societal impacts such as coastal sea level, extreme heat and storms, temperature and precipitation patterns, and large-scale climate variability. This societal importance has motivated paleo-reconstructions, climate and ocean modelling on varying time and spatial scales, and in the past 20 years, direct observation of the MOC. We have learned a lot, but have also generated more questions.
This symposium welcomes abstracts on observations, theory, and numerical modelling of the MOC that address the burning questions that have yet to be answered and the timescales of change yet to be revealed.
Regional ocean modeling plays a crucial role in understanding and addressing marine and environmental challenges. These models simulate ocean processes and provide valuable insights into the behavior and dynamics of marine systems. This session aims to generate ideas and foster collaborations to tackle current challenges in regional ocean modeling. The session will cover topics such as an overview of regional ocean modeling, various modeling techniques, implementation and operation, coupled models and data assimilations, as well as model training and performance evaluation methods. We warmly invite researchers and modelers in ocean science to actively participate in this session.
Observation, quantification and simulation of the physical and biogeochemical processes that determine the Southern Ocean's state and transient response to external forcing are critical to our understanding of the carbon cycle, the climate system as a whole, and for reducing uncertainties in near-term climate projections. Advances in data collection, state estimation and modeling capabilities have finally established the necessary infrastructure to permit a deeper understanding of the Southern Ocean's processes that are relevant to climate. This session will present new results based on modeling and/or observational efforts that investigate biogeochemical processes, large-scale and mesoscale circulation, mixing, ocean-atmosphere and ocean-ice interactions, as well as strive to identify existing inconsistencies and assumptions that need to be re-examined.
In recent years, especially since the development of TEOS-10, there has been an increasing recognition that the properties of seawater, including not only its density, but also its chemical interactions and effects of speciation, depend on more than just a "salinity". This session, sponsored by the international Joint Committee on the Properties of Seawater (JCS) is devoted to investigations that explore the nature of such dependencies and their applications for calibration, measurement, and ocean physical dynamics and chemistry.