Overview
- Editors:
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Allan R. Robinson
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Division of Applied Sciences, Harvard University, Cambridge, USA
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Table of contents (24 papers)
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Models
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- W. R. Holland, D. E. Harrison, A. J. Semtner Jr.
Pages 379-403
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Effects and Applications
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Front Matter
Pages 439-439
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- D. B. Haidvogel, A. R. Robinson, C. G. H. Rooth
Pages 481-491
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- M. V. Angel, M. J. R. Fasham
Pages 492-524
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- R. C. Spindel, Y. J.-F. Desaubies
Pages 525-541
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Back Matter
Pages 568-612
About this book
It is now well known that the mid-ocean flow is almost everywhere domi nated by so-called synoptic or meso-scale eddies, rotating about nearly vertical axes and extending throughout the water column. A typical mid ocean horizontal scale is 100 km and a time scale is 100 days: these meso scale eddies have swirl speeds of order 10 cm s -1 which are usually con siderably greater than the long-term average flow. Many types of eddies with somewhat different scales and characteristics have been identified. The existence of such eddies was suspected by navigators more than a century ago and confirmed by the world of C. O'D. Iselin and V. B. Stock man in the 1930's. Measurements from RIV Aries in 1959/60, using the then newly developed neutrally buoyant floats, indicated the main char acteristics of the eddies in the deep ocean of the NW Atlantic while a se ries of Soviet moored current-meter arrays culminated, in POLYGON- 1970, in the explicit mapping of an energetic anticyclonic eddy in the tropical NE Atlantic. In 1973 a large collaborative (mainly U. S. , U. K. ) program, MODE-I, produced synoptic charts for an area of the NW At lantic and confirmed the existence of an open ocean eddy field and es tablished its characteristics. Meso-scale eddies are now known to be of interest and importance to marine chemists and biologists as well as to physical oceanographers and meteorologists.
Editors and Affiliations
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Division of Applied Sciences, Harvard University, Cambridge, USA
Allan R. Robinson