Abstract
Using observations in an applied cruise of the submersible Jiaolong, water characteristics, geostrophic transport, and turbulent mixing in abyssal and hadal zones of the southern Yap Trench were studied. The spatial structures of deep water show that the abyssal water is cold, saline, and oxygen rich. The hadal water has very small changes in potential temperature and potential density, and a little decrease in salinity and obvious decrease in oxygen. The isotherm, isopycnal, and isohaline are depressed in abyss over the central trench. The turbulent mixing is enhanced in the near-bottom zone and the hadal water on the trench slope, especially at the steep slope, the dissipation rate and diffusivity is strong, which weakens the stratification. The geostrophic flows move southward in the western region of the trench and northward in the eastern region, indicating cyclonic circulation. In the central region of the trench, the water transport is ~1.74 Sv southward. In the hadal zone, the northward and southward transports are balanced. Our analysis suggests that the abyssal water in the southern Yap Trench is from Lower Circumpolar Water (LCPW) and the hadal water seems to be of the isolated local water rather than LCPW.
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Data Availability Statement
The data that support the findings of this study, described in Section 2.2, are available from the National Deep Sea Center, Ministry of Natural Resources of China but restrictions apply to the availability of the data, which were used under license for the current study, and so are not publicly available. However, data are available from the first author of this paper upon reasonable request and with permission of the National Deep Sea Center, Ministry of Natural Resources of China.
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Acknowledgment
We thank the crews and scientists aboard R/V Xiangyanghong 9 and the submersible Jiaolong for data acquisition and sample collections in the No. 38 of Chinese Ocean Cruises. We acknowledge the National Deep Sea Center, Ministry of Natural Resources of China for providing observation data of Jiaolong. We thank Dr. YANG Jichao, Dr. WANG Chunsheng, and Dr. LU Bo for their cooperation and helps in data sharing. We also thank the anonymous reviewers for providing valuable suggestions.
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Supported by the National Key Basic Research Program of China (973 Program) (No. 2015CB755904) and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 41276036)
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Liu, X., Liu, Y., Cao, W. et al. Water characteristics of abyssal and hadal zones in the southern Yap Trench observed with the submersible Jiaolong. J. Ocean. Limnol. 38, 593–605 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00343-019-8368-6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00343-019-8368-6