Li et al. (2025) Revisiting the Role of Ocean Circulation Changes in Polar Ocean Heat Transport Anomalies under Global Warming

⚠️ Warning: This summary was generated from the abstract only, as the full text was not available.

Identification

• Journal: Journal of Climate
• Year: 2025
• Date: 2025-10-07
• Authors: Qiuxian Li, Wei Cheng, Kyle C. Armour, LuAnne Thompson, Oluwayemi A. Garuba
• DOI: 10.1175/jcli-d-25-0135.1

Research Groups

[Information not available in the provided abstract.]

Short Summary

This study introduces a novel passive-active decomposition to re-evaluate the contributions of ocean circulation and passive ocean temperature changes to polar ocean heat transport anomalies, demonstrating that circulation changes have a significantly weaker effect than inferred from the standard decomposition.

Objective

• To address the incompleteness of the standard thermodynamic-dynamic decomposition of ocean heat transport anomalies and assess the relative contributions of ocean circulation and passive ocean temperature changes to polar ocean heat transport anomalies using a novel passive-active decomposition.

Study Configuration

• Spatial Scale: Global climate model simulations focusing on polar regions (Southern Ocean, Arctic).
• Temporal Scale: Long-term climate change scenarios in response to greenhouse gas forcing.

Methodology and Data

• Models used: A fully coupled climate model.
• Data sources: Output from the fully coupled climate model.

Main Results

• The passive-active decomposition indicates that ocean circulation changes have a much weaker effect on polar ocean heat transport anomalies compared to inferences from the standard decomposition.
• This conclusion holds regardless of how an ambiguous advective term (involving both circulation and passive temperature changes) is classified.

Contributions

• Introduces a novel passive-active decomposition method to more accurately isolate the role of circulation changes in ocean heat transport anomalies.
• Helps reconcile conclusions from studies using the standard decomposition with those employing passive tracer methods to assess the role of circulation changes in polar ocean heat transport anomalies.

Funding

[Information not available in the provided abstract.]

Citation

@article{Li2025Revisiting,
  author = {Li, Qiuxian and Cheng, Wei and Armour, Kyle C. and Thompson, LuAnne and Garuba, Oluwayemi A.},
  title = {Revisiting the Role of Ocean Circulation Changes in Polar Ocean Heat Transport Anomalies under Global Warming},
  journal = {Journal of Climate},
  year = {2025},
  doi = {10.1175/jcli-d-25-0135.1},
  url = {https://doi.org/10.1175/jcli-d-25-0135.1}
}