Author(s): Mark A. Hopkins; Alan S. Thorndike
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Keywords: No Keywords
Abstract: We use a Lagrangian discrete element model of the Arctic ice pack that is capable of resolving individual leads and pressure ridging sites to determine whether the LKFs that criss-cross the Arctic basin are primarily caused by the geometry of the land and islands that surround the basin or the wind fields that drive the ice pack. We construct 5 models of the Arctic basin at 13-km resolution by progressively morphing the basin perimeter from its actual shape to a circle in uniform steps. We ran a 10-day simulation with each model using the same 10-day series of daily wind fields. Each simulation began with a uniform ice thickness field over the entire basin. We compare average thickness, divergence, vorticity, and shear fields at the end of the 10-day simulation.
Year: 2002