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Updated: Aug 7, 2025

Surface Renewal: An Advanced Micrometeorological Method for Measuring and Processing Field-Scale Energy Flux Density Data
Published on: December 12, 2013
Submesoscale inverse energy cascade enhances Southern Ocean eddy heat transport
Zhiwei Zhang1,2, Yuelin Liu3, Bo Qiu4
1Frontier Science Center for Deep Ocean Multispheres and Earth System (FDOMES) and Physical Oceanography Laboratory/Key Laboratory of Ocean Observation and Information of Hainan Province, Sanya Oceanographic Institution, Ocean University of China, Qingdao/Sanya, China. zzw330@ouc.edu.cn.
Abstract:
Oceanic eddy-induced meridional heat transport (EHT) is an important process in the Southern Ocean heat budget, the variability of which significantly modulates global meridional overturning circulation (MOC) and Antarctic sea-ice extent. Although it is recognized that mesoscale eddies with scales of ~40-300 km greatly contribute to the EHT, the role of submesoscale eddies with scales of ~1-40 km remains unclear. Here, using two state-of-the-art high-resolution simulations (resolutions of 1/48° and 1/24°), we find that submesoscale eddies significantly enhance the total poleward EHT in the Southern Ocean with an enhancement percentage reaching 19-48% in the Antarctic Circumpolar Current band. By comparing the eddy energy budgets between the two simulations, we detect that the primary role of submesoscale eddies is to strengthen mesoscale eddies (and thus their heat transport capability) through inverse energy cascade rather than directly through submesoscale heat fluxes. Due to the submesoscale-mediated enhancement of mesoscale eddies in the 1/48° simulation, the clockwise upper cell and anti-clockwise lower cell of the residual-mean MOC in the Southern Ocean are weakened and strengthened, respectively. This finding identifies a potential route to improve the mesoscale parameterization in climate models for more accurate simulations of the MOC and sea ice variability in the Southern Ocean.
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