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Increasing stratification as observed by satellite sea surface salinity measurements
Changes in the Earth’s water cycle can be estimated by analyzing sea surface salinity. This variable reflects the balance between precipitation and evaporation over the ocean, since the upper layers of the ocean are the most sensitive to atmosphere–ocean interactions. In situ measurements lack spati...
Autores principales: | , , , , , , , , , , , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
Nature Publishing Group UK
2022
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9012883/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35428759 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41598-022-10265-1 |
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author | Olmedo, Estrella Turiel, Antonio González-Gambau, Verónica González-Haro, Cristina García-Espriu, Aina Gabarró, Carolina Portabella, Marcos Corbella, Ignasi Martín-Neira, Manuel Arias, Manuel Catany, Rafael Sabia, Roberto Oliva, Roger Scipal, Klaus |
author_facet | Olmedo, Estrella Turiel, Antonio González-Gambau, Verónica González-Haro, Cristina García-Espriu, Aina Gabarró, Carolina Portabella, Marcos Corbella, Ignasi Martín-Neira, Manuel Arias, Manuel Catany, Rafael Sabia, Roberto Oliva, Roger Scipal, Klaus |
author_sort | Olmedo, Estrella |
collection | PubMed |
description | Changes in the Earth’s water cycle can be estimated by analyzing sea surface salinity. This variable reflects the balance between precipitation and evaporation over the ocean, since the upper layers of the ocean are the most sensitive to atmosphere–ocean interactions. In situ measurements lack spatial and temporal synopticity and are typically acquired at few meters below the surface. Satellite measurements, on the contrary, are synoptic, repetitive and acquired at the surface. Here we show that the satellite-derived sea surface salinity measurements evidence an intensification of the water cycle (the freshest waters become fresher and vice-versa) which is not observed at the in-situ near-surface salinity measurements. The largest positive differences between surface and near-surface salinity trends are located over regions characterized by a decrease in the mixed layer depth and the sea surface wind speed, and an increase in sea surface temperature, which is consistent with an increased stratification of the water column due to global warming. These results highlight the crucial importance of using satellites to unveil critical changes on ocean–atmosphere fluxes. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-9012883 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2022 |
publisher | Nature Publishing Group UK |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-90128832022-04-18 Increasing stratification as observed by satellite sea surface salinity measurements Olmedo, Estrella Turiel, Antonio González-Gambau, Verónica González-Haro, Cristina García-Espriu, Aina Gabarró, Carolina Portabella, Marcos Corbella, Ignasi Martín-Neira, Manuel Arias, Manuel Catany, Rafael Sabia, Roberto Oliva, Roger Scipal, Klaus Sci Rep Article Changes in the Earth’s water cycle can be estimated by analyzing sea surface salinity. This variable reflects the balance between precipitation and evaporation over the ocean, since the upper layers of the ocean are the most sensitive to atmosphere–ocean interactions. In situ measurements lack spatial and temporal synopticity and are typically acquired at few meters below the surface. Satellite measurements, on the contrary, are synoptic, repetitive and acquired at the surface. Here we show that the satellite-derived sea surface salinity measurements evidence an intensification of the water cycle (the freshest waters become fresher and vice-versa) which is not observed at the in-situ near-surface salinity measurements. The largest positive differences between surface and near-surface salinity trends are located over regions characterized by a decrease in the mixed layer depth and the sea surface wind speed, and an increase in sea surface temperature, which is consistent with an increased stratification of the water column due to global warming. These results highlight the crucial importance of using satellites to unveil critical changes on ocean–atmosphere fluxes. Nature Publishing Group UK 2022-04-15 /pmc/articles/PMC9012883/ /pubmed/35428759 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41598-022-10265-1 Text en © The Author(s) 2022 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Open AccessThis article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) . |
spellingShingle | Article Olmedo, Estrella Turiel, Antonio González-Gambau, Verónica González-Haro, Cristina García-Espriu, Aina Gabarró, Carolina Portabella, Marcos Corbella, Ignasi Martín-Neira, Manuel Arias, Manuel Catany, Rafael Sabia, Roberto Oliva, Roger Scipal, Klaus Increasing stratification as observed by satellite sea surface salinity measurements |
title | Increasing stratification as observed by satellite sea surface salinity measurements |
title_full | Increasing stratification as observed by satellite sea surface salinity measurements |
title_fullStr | Increasing stratification as observed by satellite sea surface salinity measurements |
title_full_unstemmed | Increasing stratification as observed by satellite sea surface salinity measurements |
title_short | Increasing stratification as observed by satellite sea surface salinity measurements |
title_sort | increasing stratification as observed by satellite sea surface salinity measurements |
topic | Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9012883/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35428759 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41598-022-10265-1 |
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