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Response of an ocean general circulation model to wind and thermodynamic forcings

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Abstract

The stretched-coordinate ocean general circulation model has been designed to study the observed variability due to wind and thermodynamic forcings. The model domain extends from 60‡N to 60‡S and cyclically continuous in the longitudinal direction. The horizontal resolution is 5‡ x 5‡ and 9 discrete vertical levels. First a spin-up experiment has been done with ECMWF-AMIP 1979 January mean fields. The wind stress, ambient atmospheric temperature, evaporation and precipitation have been used in order to derive mechanical and thermodynamical surface forcings. Next, the experiment has been extended for another 30 years (3 cycles each of 10 year period) with varying surface boundary conditions (from January 1979 to December 1988 of ECMWF-AMIP monthly fields for each cycle) along with 120 years extended spin-up control run's results as initial conditions. The results presented here are for the last 10 years simulations. The preliminary results of this experiment show that the model is capable of simulating some of the general features and the pattern of interannual variability of the ocean.

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Chakraborty, A., Upadhyaya, H.C. & Sharma, O.P. Response of an ocean general circulation model to wind and thermodynamic forcings. J Earth Syst Sci 109, 329–337 (2000). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02702205

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02702205

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