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The Southern Ocean is rich in highly dynamic mesoscale eddies and substantially modulates global biogeochemical cycles. However, the overall surface and subsurface effects of eddies on the Southern Ocean biogeochemistry have not been quantified observationally at a large scale. Here, we co-locate eddies, identified in the Meta3.2DT satellite altimeter-based product, with biogeochemical Argo floats to determine the effects of eddies on the dissolved inorganic carbon (DIC), nitrate, and dissolved oxygen concentrations in the upper 1,500 m of the ice-free Southern Ocean, as well as the eddy effects on the carbon fluxes in this region. DIC and nitrate concentrations are lower in anticyclonic eddies (AEs) and increased in cyclonic eddies (CEs), while dissolved oxygen anomalies switch signs above (CEs: positive, AEs: negative) and below the mixed layer (CEs: negative, AEs: positive). We attribute these anomalies primarily to eddy pumping (isopycnal heave), as well as eddy trapping for oxygen. Maximum anomalies in all tracers occur at greater depths in the subduction zone north of the Antarctic Circumpolar Current (ACC) compared to the upwelling region in the ACC, reflecting differences in background vertical structures. Eddy effects on air-sea CO2 exchange have significant seasonal variability, with additional outgassing in CEs in fall (physical process) and additional oceanic uptake in AEs and CEs in spring (biological and physical process). Integrated over the Southern Ocean, AEs contribute ∼0.03± 0.01 Pg C yr-1 (7 ±2% ) to the Southern Ocean carbon uptake, and CEs offset this by ∼0.01± 0.01 Pg C yr-1 (2 ±2% ). These findings underscore the importance of considering eddy impacts in observing networks and climate models.

The Southern Ocean (SO) plays a crucial role in the process of sequestering heat and carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and transferring them to the deep ocean. This process is intricately linked to the formation of Antarctic Intermediate Water (AAIW) and Subantarctic Mode Water (SAMW), which are pivotal components of the Meridional Overturning Circulation (MOC) and have a substantial impact on the global climate balance. AAIW and SAMW take shape in specific regions of the Southern Ocean due to the influence of strong winds, buoyancy fluxes, and their effects, such as convection, the development of thick mixed layers, and wind‐driven subduction. These water masses subsequently flow northward, contributing to the ventilation of the intermediate layers within the subtropical gyres. In this study, our focus lies on investigating the regional aspects of AAIW and SAMW transformation in CMIP6 models. We accomplish this by analyzing the relationship between the meridional transport of these water masses and air‐sea fluxes, particularly Ekman pumping, freshwater fluxes, and heat fluxes. Our findings reveal that the highest transformation rates occur in the Indian sector of the Southern Ocean, with notable values also observed in the southeast Pacific and south of Africa. Additionally, we assess the potential changes in these formation regions under future scenarios projected for the end of the 21st century. Although the patterns of formation regions remain consistent, there is a significant decrease in the transformation process. Plain Language Summary: The ocean plays a fundamental role in the climate system, serving as a vital reservoir for storing and distributing substantial amounts of heat and carbon. Within this context, the Southern Ocean assumes a critical role, as it is the site where significant volumes of water undergo deepening processes, ultimately giving rise to distinct water masses that occupy the intermediate and deep layers of the ocean. This study employs a suite of climate models to delve into the intricacies of the system governing the formation and transformation of specific water masses, namely Antarctic Intermediate Water (AAIW) and Subantarctic Mode Water (SAMW). Our primary objective is to identify the regions within which these water masses originate, comprehend their variability, and assess potential impacts in a future scenario influenced by climate change. Most climate models accurately replicate these formation areas. Moreover, consistent with observations, climate models depict the northward transport of AAIW/SAMW occurring primarily on the western side of the ocean basins. However, concerning future scenarios, we observe a reduction in the volume of water being formed in the Southern Ocean, signifying potential changes in the dynamics of these critical water masses. Key Points: Intermediate water masses are relatively accurately spatially transformed in the climate modelsIntermediate water masses are primarily transported along the boundaries of the ocean basinsThe transformation of water masses decreases in the future climate change scenarios [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ocean acidification has potentially large impacts on calcifying organisms and ecosystems. Argo floats equipped with biogeochemical (BGC) sensors have been continuously measuring Southern Ocean pH since 2014. These BGC‐Argo floats were deployed as part of the Southern Ocean Carbon and Climate Observations and Modeling project. Here we present a SOCCOM‐era Objectively Mapped pH (SOM‐pH) 2014–2019 climatology and explain the method for constructing this product. We show example SOM‐pH fields demonstrating the spatial and temporal structure of Southern Ocean pH. Comparison with previous ship‐based measurements reveals decreases in pH of up to 0.02 per decade, with a structure decaying with depth. An assessment of the trend structure reveals a pattern indicative of the meridional overturning circulation. Upwelling waters that have not been in recent contact with the atmosphere show negligible or small trends, while surface and downwelling waters that have had more exposure to the atmosphere show the strongest trends. Thus comparison of this new BGC‐Argo mapped pH estimate to historic observations allows quantifying the structure of Southern Ocean acidification. Plain Language Summary: Robotic instruments that measure ocean acidity levels (pH) have been deployed in the Southern Ocean since 2014. Here we compile these observations into a map that is an estimate of the current Southern Ocean pH. This paper discusses how the map is made and gives a brief description of its features. We then compare it to pH measurements made from ships prior to 2014. Analyzing the structure of these differences in space and time reveals how the Southern Ocean is becoming more acidic. We find that there is significant structure to the changes. In general the changes are largest at the surface and become smaller at greater depth. However, there are horizontal differences. Ocean locations where winds pull up deep waters have smaller trends than regions where the winds are pushing waters down. Thus the ocean changes show a signature associated with the large‐scale circulation. Key Points: We present a novel 12‐month Southern Ocean pH mapped product, made possible by the Biogeochemical‐Argo array initiated in 2014Comparing to ship‐based measurements above 1,500 m reveals a decrease in pH of up to 0.02 per decadepH changes are widespread with varying magnitudes reflecting the pattern of the meridional overturning circulation [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Previous studies proposed that the increase in the eddy kinetic energy (EKE) in the Southern Ocean in recent decades is primarily caused by the strengthening of circumpolar surface westerlies. However, the spatial pattern of EKE change does not match the pattern of wind change. Here, we revisit the relationship between EKE and wind stress through an observational analysis and model experiments and show that the change in EKE is primarily determined by the mean flow. The increasing wind stress intensifies the circumpolar mean flow contributing to increasing EKE; yet strong EKE variations are generally confined downstream of major topographic features. This arises from the releasing of available potential energy as the mean flow passes through the topography. Our results indicate that the change in Southern Ocean eddy activity has a distinct localization characteristic due to the strong dynamical influence of topography. Plain Language Summary: Eddy kinetic energy has been increasing in the Southern Ocean over the past few decades. These changes in the eddy field are of great importance because they play a crucial role in modulating the ocean circulation response to surface forcing. However, the eddy kinetic energy (EKE) changes are inhomogeneous in the Southern Ocean. To understand the pattern of these changes, we analyze the satellite altimeter record over a period of 28 years since 1993 and carry out a set of idealized simulations. We find that the change of EKE is more related to the mean flow than to localized wind changes. The increasing wind stress contributes to increasing EKE by intensifying the circumpolar mean flow with local wind stress playing a minor role in the pattern of EKE changes. Strong EKE variations are generally confined downstream of major topographic features, suggesting strong modulation by topography. This study indicates the change of EKE depends on the combination of wind stress, mean flow, and topography in the Southern Ocean. Key Points: Eddy activity patterns are primarily determined by Southern Ocean topographic featuresLocal wind stress plays a minor role in modulating the pattern of eddy activityWind stress intensifies mean flow and topography sets locations of conversion to eddy activity [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Subduction in the Antarctic circumpolar region of the Southern Ocean (SO) results in the formation of Antarctic Intermediate Water (AAIW) and Subantarctic Mode Water (SAMW). Theoretical understanding predicts that subduction rates of these waters masses is driven by wind stress curl and buoyancy fluxes. The objective of this work is to evaluate the extent to which AAIW and SAMW variability are correlated to SO air‐sea fluxes and how potential changes to those forcings would impact the future water mass export rates. We correlate the water mass volume transport at 30°S with Ekman pumping, freshwater and heat fluxes in the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project. The export of these water masses varies across models, with most overestimating the total transport. Correlation coefficients between the air‐sea fluxes and exports are consistent with theoretical expectations. In the picontrol/historical scenarios, the highest correlations with AAIW export variability are heat flux, while Ekman pumping best explains SAMW. However, multivariate regressions show that both AAIW and SAMW export variability are better explained using the combination of all three fluxes. In future scenario simulations air‐sea fluxes trend significantly in the catastrophic scenario (RCP8.5 and SSP8.5). Both AAIW and SAMW are still highly correlated to the fluxes, but with different correlation coefficients. The dominant forcing components even change from the present simulations to the future scenario runs. Thus, correlations between AAIW and SAMW transports and air‐sea fluxes are not stationary in time, limiting the predictive skill of statistical models and highlighting the importance of using complex climate models. Plain Language Summary: The ocean plays a fundamental role in the climate system, storing and transporting heat and carbon. In particular, water mass changes that occur in the Southern Ocean (SO) play an important role in setting the properties of the global ocean interior. Here we use climate models to investigate aspects of the system affecting this oceanic transport and storage of interior water masses, focusing on the ocean's intermediate layer. These intermediate waters that are exported from the SO to the rest of the global oceans are known as Antarctic Intermediate Water (AAIW) and Subantarctic Mode Water (SAMW). The main goal of this study is to determine what processes are driving their temporal variability and how those water masses would be impacted in the future due to climate change. We find that AAIW and SAMW are highly correlated with wind stress, heat and freshwater exchanges between the ocean and atmosphere. Future scenarios project significant changes for those fluxes, leading to warmer and saltier waters and more intense winds. These cause relevant alterations in the volume transport of both water masses in the future scenarios, especially for the scenario with the most extreme changes, with implications for stability of the climate system. Key Points: Antarctic Intermediate Water and Subantarctic Mode Water export is highly variable and correlated with multiple flux componentsThe volume export variability follows expected theoretical relationships with fluxesExport is projected to increase, and was not skillfully predicted assuming stationary statistics [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

New estimates of pCO2 from profiling floats deployed by the Southern Ocean Carbon and Climate Observations and Modeling (SOCCOM) project have demonstrated the importance of wintertime outgassing south of the Polar Front, challenging the accepted magnitude of Southern Ocean carbon uptake (Gray et al., 2018, https://doi:10.1029/2018GL078013). Here, we put 3.5 years of SOCCOM observations into broader context with the global surface carbon dioxide database (Surface Ocean CO2 Atlas, SOCAT) by using the two interpolation methods currently used to assess the ocean models in the Global Carbon Budget (Le Quéré et al., 2018, https://doi:10.5194/essd‐10‐2141‐2018) to create a ship‐only, a float‐weighted, and a combined estimate of Southern Ocean carbon fluxes (<35°S). In our ship‐only estimate, we calculate a mean uptake of −1.14 ± 0.19 Pg C/yr for 2015–2017, consistent with prior studies. The float‐weighted estimate yields a significantly lower Southern Ocean uptake of −0.35 ± 0.19 Pg C/yr. Subsampling of high‐resolution ocean biogeochemical process models indicates that some of the differences between float and ship‐only estimates of the Southern Ocean carbon flux can be explained by spatial and temporal sampling differences. The combined ship and float estimate minimizes the root‐mean‐square pCO2 difference between the mapped product and both data sets, giving a new Southern Ocean uptake of −0.75 ± 0.22 Pg C/yr, though with uncertainties that overlap the ship‐only estimate. An atmospheric inversion reveals that a shift of this magnitude in the contemporary Southern Ocean carbon flux must be compensated for by ocean or land sinks within the Southern Hemisphere. Plain Language Summary: The Southern Ocean is thought to take up a significant amount of carbon dioxide each year but is a difficult region to observe due to its remote location and harsh winter weather. Recently, autonomous robots deployed by the Southern Ocean Carbon and Climate Observations and Modeling project have been making year‐round measurements of ocean carbonate chemistry, from which we can estimate surface carbon dioxide. These provide new data at times and locations where we previously had very little. We found that combining the float observations with traditional shipboard data reduced our estimate for the amount carbon that the Southern Ocean takes up each year, though by less than had been previously estimated when considering float observations alone. We also show that some of the new signals is likely due to the differences in when and where floats make measurements. The magnitude of difference between prior estimates of the Southern Ocean carbon flux and our new approach is significant, ~20% of the contemporary global ocean carbon flux. It is therefore crucial to understand how this may impact the global carbon cycle, and we show that a compensating flux must be found somewhere within the Southern Hemisphere. Key Points: A combined ship and float carbon dioxide flux estimate for the Southern Ocean yields 0.4 Pg C/yr less uptake than a ship‐only estimateModel subsampling indicates that some of the differences between ship and float flux estimates may be due to sampling times and locationsAn atmospheric inversion using the new ocean fluxes indicates that any compensating flux must be found in land or ocean south of 5°S [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Drake Passage Time‐series (DPT) is used to quantify the spatial and seasonal variability of historically undersampled, biogeochemically relevant properties across the Drake Passage. From 2004–2017, discrete ship‐based observations of surface macronutrients (silicate, nitrate, and phosphate), temperature, and salinity have been collected 5–8 times per year as part of the DPT program. Using the DPT and Antarctic Circumpolar Current (ACC) front locations derived from concurrent expendable bathythermograph data, the distinct physical and biogeochemical characteristics of ACC frontal zones are characterized. Biogeochemical‐Argo floats in the region confirm that the near‐surface sampling scheme of the DPT robustly captures mixed‐layer biogeochemistry. While macronutrient concentrations consistently increase toward the Antarctic continent, their meridional distribution, variability, and biogeochemical gradients are unique across physical ACC fronts, suggesting a combination of physical and biological processes controlling nutrient availability and nutrient front location. The Polar Front is associated with the northern expression of the Silicate Front, marking the biogeographically relevant location between silicate‐poor and silicate‐rich waters. South of the northern Silicate Front, the silicate‐to‐nitrate ratio increases, with the sharpest gradient in silicate associated with the Southern ACC Front (i.e., the southern expression of the Silicate Front). Nutrient cycling is an important control on variability in the surface ocean partial pressure of carbon dioxide (pCO2). The robust characterization of the spatiotemporal variability of nutrients presented here highlights the utility of biogeochemical time series for diagnosing and potentially reducing biases in modeling Southern Ocean pCO2 variability, and by inference, air‐sea CO2 flux. Plain Language Summary: Nutrients fuel phytoplankton communities that are important in the marine food web and global carbon cycling. Understanding modern‐day nutrient availability and its physical and biological drivers is critical to accurately predict future climate with models. The Southern Ocean helps regulate climate and is vulnerable to future change, but as one of the least sampled oceans, physical and biogeochemical processes are still not fully understood. This study uses the 13‐year Drake Passage Time‐series, the longest year‐round biogeochemical time series in the Southern Ocean, to quantify nutrient availability and variability on seasonal time scales. Across Drake Passage, temperatures decrease and nutrients increase toward Antarctica, exhibiting sharp gradients at currents and creating conditions favoring distinct phytoplankton groups. Nutrients are used by phytoplankton in summer and regenerated and resupplied by mixing in winter; these processes draw surface ocean carbon down in summer and increase carbon in winter. While nitrate is a necessary nutrient for all phytoplankton, silicate is only required by a single major phytoplankton group. Simultaneous observations of both nutrients allows us to better understand group‐specific productivity and, ultimately, its impact on climate. Key Points: The surface sampling scheme of the Drake Passage Time‐series program robustly captures mixed‐layer biogeochemistrySurface silicate and nitrate vary distinctly by frontal zone and season, each driven by unique physical and biological processesObservational constraints on the seasonal cycling of nutrients serve as a metric for validating and improving biogeochemical models [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: The wind stress that drives the Antarctic Circumpolar Current (ACC) exits the fluid via topographic form stress (TFS) at the sea floor; interfacial form stress (IFS) is thought to carry much of this momentum from source to sink. These form stresses combine to help set the strength and structure of the Southern Ocean meridional overturning circulation (MOC), a key nexus of heat and gas exchange between the deep ocean and the atmosphere. For the first time in a general circulation model, we calculate the time‐varying, three‐dimensional IFS field directly from zonal pressure gradients across vertical perturbations in isopycnal layer interfaces. We confirm previous findings that IFS compensates wind stress at the surface and topographic form stress at the seafloor in the Drake Passage latitudes. We find that zonal and time‐mean IFS is primarily responsible for this surface wind stress compensation, with some contribution from transient eddy IFS. Mean, standing eddy, and transient eddy IFS combine to compensate topographic form stress at depth. Both standing and transient eddy IFS concentrate at stationary meanders along the ACC, and transient eddy IFS dominates standing eddy IFS in regions of high eddy kinetic energy. Finally, total IFS changes sign from balancing eastward wind stress to balancing westward topographic form stress around 28.1 kg m−3, close to the upper limit of Antarctic Bottom Water, indicating the role of buoyancy forcing in setting the structure of the IFS field. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Here we present initial findings from nine profiling floats equipped with pH, O2, NO 3 –, and other biogeochemical sensors that were deployed in the seasonal ice zone (SIZ) of the Southern Ocean in 2014 and 2015 through the Southern Ocean Carbon and Climate Observations and Modelling (SOCCOM) project. A large springtime phytoplankton bloom was observed that coincided with sea ice melt for all nine floats. We argue this bloom results from a shoaling of the mixed layer depth, increased vertical stability, and enhanced nutrient and light availability as the sea ice melts. This interpretation is supported by the absence of a springtime bloom when one of the floats left the SIZ in the second year of observations. During the sea ice covered period, net heterotrophic conditions were observed. The rate of uptake of O2 and release of dissolved inorganic carbon (derived from pH and estimated total alkalinity) and NO 3 – is reminiscent of biological respiration and is nearly Redfieldian for the nine floats. A simple model of mixed layer physics was developed to separate the physical and biological components of the signal in pH and O2 over one annual cycle for a float in the Ross Sea SIZ. The resulting annual net community production suggests that seasonal respiration during the ice covered period of the year nearly balances the production in the euphotic layer of up to 5 mol C m−2 during the ice free period leading to a net of near zero carbon exported to depth for this one float. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The upper ocean dissolved inorganic carbon (DIC) concentration is regulated by advective and diffusive transport divergence, biological processes, freshwater, and air-sea CO2 fluxes. The relative importance of these mechanisms in the Southern Ocean is uncertain, as year-round observations in this area have been limited. We use a novel physical-biogeochemical state estimate of the Southern Ocean to construct a closed DIC budget of the top 650 m and investigate the spatial and temporal variability of the different components of the carbon system. The dominant mechanisms of variability in upper ocean DIC depend on location and time and space scales considered. Advective transport is the most influential mechanism and governs the local DIC budget across the 10 day-5 year timescales analyzed. Diffusive effects are nearly negligible. The large-scale transport structure is primarily set by upwelling and downwelling, though both the lateral ageostrophic and geostrophic transports are significant. In the Antarctic Circumpolar Current, the carbon budget components are also influenced by the presence of topography and biological hot spots. In the subtropics, evaporation and air-sea CO2 flux primarily balances the sink due to biological production and advective transport. Finally, in the subpolar region sea ice processes, which change the seawater volume and thus the DIC concentration, compensate the large impact of the advective transport and modulate the timing of biological activity and air-sea CO2 flux. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The spatial structure of the upper ocean heat budget in the Antarctic Circumpolar Current (ACC) is investigated using the ⅙°, data-assimilating Southern Ocean State Estimate (SOSE) for 2005-10. The ACC circumpolar integrated budget shows that 0.27 PW of ocean heat gain from the atmosphere and 0.38 PW heat gain from divergence of geostrophic heat transport are balanced by −0.58 PW cooling by divergence of Ekman heat transport and −0.09 PW divergence of vertical heat transport. However, this circumpolar integrated balance obscures important zonal variations in the heat budget. The air-sea heat flux shows a zonally asymmetric pattern of ocean heat gain in the Indian and Atlantic sectors and ocean heat loss in the Pacific sector of the ACC. In the Atlantic and Indian sectors of the ACC, the surface ocean heat gain is primarily balanced by divergence of equatorward Ekman heat transport that cools the upper ocean. In the Pacific sector, surface ocean heat loss and cooling due to divergence of Ekman heat transport are balanced by warming due to divergence of geostrophic heat advection, which is similar to the dominant heat balance in the subtropical Agulhas Return Current. The divergence of horizontal and vertical eddy advection of heat is important for warming the upper ocean close to major topographic features, while the divergence of mean vertical heat advection is a weak cooling term. The results herein show that topographic steering and zonal asymmetry in air-sea exchange lead to substantial zonal asymmetries in the heat budget, which is important for understanding the upper cell of the overturning circulation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Southern Ocean (SO) limb of the meridional overturning circulation (MOC) is characterized by three vertically stacked cells, each with a transport of about 10 Sv (Sv ≡ 106 m3 s−1). The buoyancy transport in the SO is dominated by the upper and middle MOC cells, with the middle cell accounting for most of the buoyancy transport across the Antarctic Circumpolar Current. A Southern Ocean state estimate for the years 2005 and 2006 with ⅙° resolution is used to determine the forces balancing this MOC. Diagnosing the zonal momentum budget in density space allows an exact determination of the adiabatic and diapycnal components balancing the thickness-weighted (residual) meridional transport. It is found that, to lowest order, the transport consists of an eddy component, a directly wind-driven component, and a component in balance with mean pressure gradients. Nonvanishing time-mean pressure gradients arise because isopycnal layers intersect topography or the surface in a circumpolar integral, leading to a largely geostrophic MOC even in the latitude band of Drake Passage. It is the geostrophic water mass transport in the surface layer where isopycnals outcrop that accomplishes the poleward buoyancy transport. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An eddy-permitting state estimate and its adjoint are used to analyze the influence of wind stress perturbations on the transport of the Antarctic Circumpolar Current (ACC) system through Drake Passage. The transport is found to be sensitive to wind stress perturbations both along the ACC path and also in remote regions. The time scale of influence of wind stress perturbations is on the order of 100 days. Regarding spatial scales, the sensitivity of transport to wind stress is relatively smooth in regions of flat topography. In boundary regions and regions with complex topography, however, the sensitivity is enhanced and characterized by shorter length scales of order 100 km. Positive perturbations to the zonal wind stress usually increase the ACC transport, though the wind stress curl is of primary influence where the currents are steered by topography. Highlighting locations where the ACC is especially responsive to air-sea momentum fluxes reveals where an accurate determination of atmospheric winds may best enhance ocean modeling efforts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The authors have intercompared the following six surface buoyancy flux estimates, averaged over the years 2005-07: two reanalyses [the recent ECMWF reanalysis (ERA-Interim; hereafter ERA), and the National Centers for Environmental Prediction (NCEP)-NCAR reanalysis 1 (hereafter NCEP1)], two recent flux products developed as an improvement of NCEP1 [the flux product by Large and Yeager and the Southern Ocean State Estimate (SOSE)], and two ad hoc air-sea flux estimates that are obtained by combining the NCEP1 or ERA net radiative fluxes with turbulent flux estimates using the Coupled Ocean-Atmosphere Response Experiment (COARE) 3.0 bulk formulas with NCEP1 or ERA input variables. The accuracy of SOSE adjustments of NCEP1 atmospheric fields (which SOSE uses as an initial guess and a constraint) was assessed by verification that SOSE reduces the biases in the NCEP1 fluxes as diagnosed by the Working Group on Air-Sea Fluxes (Taylor), suggesting that oceanic observations may be a valuable constraint to improve atmospheric variables. Compared with NCEP1, both SOSE and Large and Yeager increase the net ocean heat loss in high latitudes, decrease ocean heat loss in the subtropical Indian Ocean, decrease net evaporation in the subtropics, and decrease net precipitation in polar latitudes. The large-scale pattern of SOSE and Large and Yeager turbulent heat flux adjustment is similar, but the magnitude of SOSE adjustments is significantly larger. Their radiative heat flux adjustments patterns differ. Turbulent heat fluxes determined by combining COARE bulk formulas with NCEP1 or ERA should not be combined with unmodified NCEP1 or ERA radiative fluxes as the net ocean heat gain poleward of 25°S becomes unrealistically large. The other surface flux products (i.e., NCEP1, ERA, Large and Yeager, and SOSE) balance more closely. Overall, the statistical estimates of the differences between the various air-sea heat flux products tend to be largest in regions with strong ocean mesoscale activity such as the Antarctic Circumpolar Current and the western boundary currents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An eddy-permitting general circulation model of the Southern Ocean is fit by constrained least squares to a large observational dataset during 2005–06. Data used include Argo float profiles, CTD synoptic sections, Southern Elephant Seals as Oceanographic Samplers (SEaOS) instrument-mounted seal profiles, XBTs, altimetric observations [ Envisat, Geosat, Jason-1, and Ocean Topography Experiment (TOPEX)/Poseidon], and infrared and microwave radiometer observed sea surface temperature. An adjoint model is used to determine descent directions in minimizing a misfit function, each of whose elements has been weighted by an estimate of the observational plus model error. The model is brought into near agreement with the data by adjusting its control vector, here consisting of initial and meteorological boundary conditions. Although total consistency has not yet been achieved, the existing solution is in good agreement with the great majority of the 2005 and 2006 Southern Ocean observations and better represents these data than does the World Ocean Atlas 2001 ( WOA01) climatological product. The estimate captures the oceanic temporal variability and in this respect represents a major improvement upon earlier static inverse estimates. During the estimation period, the Drake Passage volume transport is 153 ± 5 Sv (1 Sv ≡ 106 m3 s−1). The Ross and Weddell polar gyre transports are 20 ± 5 Sv and 40 ± 8 Sv, respectively. Across 32°S there is a surface meridional overturning cell of 12 ± 12 Sv, an intermediate cell of 17 ± 12 Sv, and an abyssal cell of 13 ± 6 Sv. The northward heat and freshwater anomaly transports across 30°S are −0.3 PW and 0.7 Sv, with estimated uncertainties of 0.5 PW and 0.2 Sv. The net rate of wind work is 2.1 ± 1.1 TW. Southern Ocean theories involving short temporal- and spatial-scale dynamics may now be tested with a dynamically and thermodynamically realistic general circulation model solution that is known to be compatible with the modern observational datasets. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• SOCCOM has deployed >260 BGC-Argo floats with O 2 , NO 3 , pH and bio-optical sensors. • SOCCOM floats operate throughout the Southern Ocean including the seasonal ice zone. • All SOCCOM float data is freely available in real-time. • A Biogeochemical Southern Ocean State Estimate (BSOSE) assimilates float data. • Float data and BSOSE are used with coupled models to better understand climate. The Southern Ocean serves as the primary gateway through which the intermediate, deep, and bottom waters of the ocean interact with the surface ocean (and thus the atmosphere), and it has a profound influence on the oceanic uptake of anthropogenic carbon and heat as well as nutrient resupply from the abyss to the surface. Yet it has been the least observed and understood region of the world ocean. The Southern Ocean Carbon and Climate Observations and Modeling (SOCCOM) project was implemented in 2014 with a goal to help remedy this deficit in observations and understanding. The SOCCOM project is based on two major advances that have the potential to transform understanding of the Southern Ocean. The first is the development of new biogeochemical sensors mounted on autonomous profiling floats that allow sampling of ocean biogeochemistry in 3-dimensional space. Floats may detect processes with a temporal resolution that ranges from hours to years. The second is that the climate modeling community finally has the computational resources and physical understanding to develop fully coupled climate models that can represent crucial, mesoscale processes in the Southern Ocean, as well as corresponding models that assimilate observations to produce a state estimate. The observational component, based on deployment of profiling floats with oxygen, nitrate, pH and bio-optical sensors, is generating vast amounts of new biogeochemical data that provide a year-round view of the Southern Ocean from the surface to 2000 m. The modeling effort is applying these observations and enhancing our understanding of the current ocean, and reducing uncertainty in projections of future carbon and nutrient cycles and climate. After nine years of operation, including a project renewal in the sixth year, the SOCCOM project has deployed more than 260 profiling floats. These floats have collected over 27,000 vertical profiles throughout the Southern Ocean. A data-assimilating biogeochemical state estimate model has been implemented. Here, the design of the SOCCOM project is reviewed and the scientific results that have been obtained are described. The project's capability to help meet the observing system priorities outlined for a notional UN Decade for Ocean Sciences Southern Ocean observing system is assessed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]