Author(s): Qun Li; Huiding Wu; Lu Zhang

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Keywords: No Keywords

Abstract: A polynya appears periodically in the Prydz Bay at front of the Amery Ice Shelf in themelting and freezing seasons. This polynya, which is mainly forced by the Antarctic katabatic wind, plays an important role in heat exchange between the ocean and atmosphere, ventilation of deep water, and is characterized by high biological productivity. In this paper, we haveconfigured a fine resolution regional ocean-sea ice-ice shelf coupled model of the Indian Ocean sector of the Southern Ocean, to simulate a full year of sea ice growth and melting, with the NCEP reanalysis atmosphere forcing field. The basic features of the modelsimulations include an increasing ice cover from March to August, an approximately constant ice cover from August to November and a decreasing ice cover from November to February. In mid-September, the Amery polynya start to develop; temporal and spatial characteristics of this polynya are well reproduced and compared with available satellite data. Sensitivityexperiments demonstrated that the synoptic wind is the primary driving force, together with the cyclonic ocean current and typical topography feature. This is similar to most of theAntarctic coastal polynyas, and the Amery ice shelf cavity-ocean process has little direct influence on the generation and maintenance of the Amery polynya.

DOI:

Year: 2010