- Antarctic Circumpolar Current
The Antarctic Circumpolar Current (ACC) is an
ocean current that flows from west to east aroundAntarctica . An alternate name for the ACC is the West Wind Drift. The ACC is the dominant circulation feature of theSouthern Ocean . It keeps warm ocean waters away from Antarctica, enabling that continent to maintain its hugeice sheet .The ACC has been known to sailors for many years;
Jack London 's story "Make Westing" poignantly illustrated the difficulty it caused for mariners seeking to roundCape Horn on the clipper ship route between New York and California.The current creates two
Antarctic gyres .Structure
The ACC connects the Atlantic, Pacific and
Indian Ocean basins, and as such serves as a principal pathway of exchange between these basins. The current is strongly constrained bylandform andbathymetric features. Starting atSouth America , it flows through theDrake Passage between South America and theAntarctic Peninsula and then is split by theScotia Arc to the east, with a shallow warm branch flowing to the north in theFalkland Current and a deeper branch passing through the Arc more to the east before also turning to the north. Passing through the Indian Ocean, the current is split by theKerguelen Plateau in the Indian Ocean, with most of the transport passing to the north. South ofNew Zealand , it follows the contours of theCampbell Plateau , first deflecting far to the south and then moving northward again. Deflection is also seen as it passes over themid-ocean ridge in the Southeast Pacific.The current consists of a number of
front s. The northern boundary of the ACC is defined by theSubtropical Front . This marks the boundary between warm, salty subtropical waters (generally with asalinity of greater than 34.9 parts per thousand) and fresher, cooler subpolar waters. Moving southward we find the Subantarctic Front, along which much of the ACC transport is carried, which is defined as the latitude at which a subsurface salinity minimum or a thick layer of unstratifiedSubantarctic Mode Water first appears. Still further south lies the Polar Front, which is marked by a transition to very cold, relatively fresh, Antarctic Surface Water at the surface. Further south still is the Southern Boundary front, which is determined as the point where very dense abyssal waters upwell to within a few hundred meters of the surface. The bulk of the transport is carried in the middle two fronts. The total transport of the ACC at Drake Passage is estimated to be around 135Sverdrup s (135,000,000 m³/s), or about 135 times the transport of all the world's rivers combined. There is a relatively small addition of flow in the Indian Ocean, with the transport south ofTasmania reaching around 147 Sv, at which point the current is probably the largest on the planet.Dynamics
There is general agreement that the large transport of the Circumpolar Current is linked to the strong westerly
wind s which are found in the Southern Ocean and that these winds blow over a band of openlatitude s. In latitudes where there are continents, winds blowing on light surface water can simply pile up light water against these continents. But in the Southern Ocean, the momentum imparted to the surface waters cannot be balanced in this way.Different theories of the Circumpolar Current balance the momentum imparted by the winds in different ways. The increasing eastward momentum imparted by the winds causes water parcels to drift outwards from the axis of the earth's rotation (in other words, northward) as a result of the
Coriolis force . This northward transport is balanced by a southward, pressure-driven flow below the depths of the major ridge systems. Some theories connect these flows directly, implying that there is significant upwelling of dense deep waters within the Southern Ocean, transformation of these waters into light surface waters, and a transformation of waters in the opposite direction to the north. Such theories link the magnitude of the Circumpolar Current with the globalthermohaline circulation , particularly the properties of the North Atlantic.Alternatively, ocean eddies, the oceanic equivalent of atmospheric storms, or the large scale meanders of the Circumpolar Current may directly transport momentum downwards in the water column. This is because such flows can produce a net southward flow in the troughs and a net northward flow over the ridges without requiring any transformation of density. In practice both the thermohaline and the eddy/meander mechanisms are likely to be important.
Formation
The Antarctic Circumpolar Current formed during Late
Eocene through EarlyOligocene , asAntarctica andSouth America finally separated enough for theDrake Passage to form some 30 to 34 million years ago. As Antarctica became isolated from warmer waters it cooled and glaciers began to form on the formerly forested continent.Studies
An expedition in May 2008 by 19 scientists studied the geology and biology of eight Manquarie Ridge sea mounts, as well as the Antarctic Circumpolar Current to investigate the effects of climate change of the southern Ocean. The circumpolar current merges the waters of the Atlantic, Indian, and Pacific Oceans and carries up to 150 times the volume of water flowing in all of the world's rivers. ] After studying the circumpolar current it is clear that it strongly influences regional and global climate as well as underwater biodiversity. [ [http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080519/ap_on_sc/antarctica_tiny_starfish;_ylt=AsdzU8nYPux2h_hkZhQx4GGs0NUE Millions of tiny starfish inhabit undersea volcano - Yahoo! News ] ]
References
* Orsi, A.H., T. Whitworth and W.D. Nowling, 1995, On the meridional extent and fronts of the Antarctic Circumpolar Current, Deep Sea Research, Series I, 42, 641-673.
External links
* http://www.literaturecollection.com/a/london/149/
* http://oceanworld.tamu.edu/resources/ocng_textbook/chapter13/chapter13_04.htm
* http://earth.usc.edu/~stott/Catalina/Oceans.html Good graphics later in article.
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