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Assimilating altimetric data to control the tropical instability waves: an observing system simulation experiment study

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Abstract

Tropical instability waves (TIWs) are not easily simulated by ocean circulation models primarily because such waves are very sensitive to wind forcing. In this study, we investigate the impact of assimilating sea surface height (SSH) observations on the control of TIWs in an observing system simulation experiment (OSSE) context based on a regional model configuration of the tropical Atlantic. A Kalman filtering method with suitable adaptations is found to be successful when altimetric data are assimilated in conjunction with sea surface temperature and some in situ temperature/salinity profiles. In this rather realistic system, the TIW phase is roughly controlled with a single nadir observing satellite. However, a right correction of the TIW structure and amplitude requires at least two nadir observing satellites or a wide swath observing satellite. The significant impact of orbital parameters is also demonstrated: in particular, the Jason or GFO satellite orbits are found to be more suitable than the ENVISAT orbit. More generally, it is found that as soon as adequate sub-sampling exists (with periods of 5–10 days), the length of the repetitivity cycle of orbits does not have a significant impact.

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Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank the CNES (Centre National d’Etudes Spatiales) for financial support and the IDRIS (Institut du Developpement et des Ressources en Informatique Scientifique) for assistance with computing. The calculations were performed using HPC resources from GENCI-IDRIS (Grant 2009-011279). Many thanks are also due to Jean-Marc Molines for helping the authors set up the model configuration.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, 4800 Oak Grove Dr., Pasadena, CA, 91109, USA

    Clement Ubelmann

  2. LEGI UMR5519, CNRS/UJF - Grenoble 1/G-INP, BP53, 38041, Grenoble, cedex 9, France

    Jacques Verron, Jean-Michel Brankart, Pierre Brasseur & Emmanuel Cosme

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  1. Clement Ubelmann
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  2. Jacques Verron
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  3. Jean-Michel Brankart
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  4. Pierre Brasseur
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  5. Emmanuel Cosme
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Correspondence to Clement Ubelmann.

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Responsible Editor: Pierre De Mey

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Ubelmann, C., Verron, J., Brankart, JM. et al. Assimilating altimetric data to control the tropical instability waves: an observing system simulation experiment study. Ocean Dynamics 62, 867–880 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10236-012-0539-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10236-012-0539-3

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