• Ocean and Polar Research
• /
• v.35 no.2
• /
• pp.171-179
• /
• 2013

The long-term variability of sea surface temperature in the East China Sea was reviewed based mainly on published literatures. Though the quantitative results are not the same, it is generally shown that sea surface temperature is increasing especially in recent years with the rate of increase about $0.03^{\circ}C$/year. Other meaningful results presented in the literatures is that the difference of water properties between layers upper and lower than the thermocline in summer shows an increasing trend both in temperature and salinity, suggesting that the stratification has been intensified. As a mechanism by which to evaluate the wintertime warming trend in the region, the weakening of wind strength, which is related to the variation of sea level pressure and atmospheric circulation in the western North Pacific and northern Asian continent, is suggested in the most of related studies.

• Proceedings of the KSRS Conference
• /
• v.1
• /
• pp.352-355
• /
• 2006

In this study, the seasonal and inter-annual variation of sea surface current in the Gulf of Thailand were revealed through the use of WOD temperature and salinity data and monthly sea surface dynamic heights (SSDH) from TOPEX/Poseidon and ERS-2 altimetry data during 1995-2001. The mean dynamic height and mean geostrohic current were derived from the climatological data while SSDH data gave monthly dynamic heights and their geopstrophic currents. The mean geostrophic current showed strong southward and westward flow of South China Sea water along the gulf entrance. Counterclockwise eddy in the inner gulf and the western side of the gulf entrance associated with upwelling in the area. Seasonal geostrophic currents show basin-wide counterclockwise circulation during the southwest monsoon season and clockwise circulation during the northeast monsoon season. Upwelling was enhanced during the southwest monsoon season. The circulation patterns varied seasonally and inter-annually probably due to the variation in wind regime. And finally we found that congregation, spawning, and migration routes of short-bodied mackerel conform well with coastal upwelling and surface circulation in the gulf.

• Journal of the korean society of oceanography
• /
• v.37 no.3
• /
• pp.187-195
• /
• 2002

The characteristics of surface circulation in the Yellow Sea and the East China Sea are discussed by analyzing a great deal of current data observed by 142 sets of mooring buoy and 58 sets of drifters trajectories collected in the Yellow Sea and the East China Sea through domestic and abroad measurements. Some major features are demonstrated as bellow: 1) Tsushima Warm Current flows away from the Kuroshio and has multiple sources in warm half year and comes only from Kuroshio surface water in cold half year. 2) Taiwan Warm Current comes mainly from the Taiwan Strait Water in warm half year and comes from the intruded Kuroshio surface water and branches near 27N in cold half year. 3) The Changjiang Diluted Water turns towards Cheju Island in summer and flows southward along the coastal line in winter. 4) The study sea area is an eddy developing area, especially in the southern area of Cheju Island and northern area of Taiwan.

• Journal of the korean society of oceanography
• /
• v.35 no.4
• /
• pp.161-169
• /
• 2000

A seasonal circulation in the East China Sea and the Yellow Sea and its possible cause have been studied with CSK data during 1965-1989. Water mass distributions are clear in winter, but not in summer because the upper layer waters are quite influenced by atmosphere. To solve the problem, a water mass analysis by mixing ratio is used for the lower layer waters. The results show that the distribution of Tsushima Warm Current Water expands to the Yellow Sea in winter and retreats to the East China Sea in summer. It means that there is a very slow seasonal circulation between the East China Sea and the Yellow Sea: Tsushima Warm Current Water flows into the Yellow Sea in winter and coastal water flows out of the Yellow Sea in summer. By the circulation, the front between Tsushima Warm Current Water and coastal water moves toward the shelf break in summer so that the flow is faster in the deeper region. The process eventually makes the transport in the Korea Strait increase. The Kuroshio does not seem to influence the process. A possible mechanism of the process is the seasonal change of sea surface slope due to different local effects of surface heating and diluting between the East China Sea and the Yellow Sea.

• Ocean and Polar Research
• /
• v.23 no.2
• /
• pp.161-172
• /
• 2001

A model-to-model comparison is attempted between Princeton Ocean Model (POM) and Miami Isopycnic Coordinate Ocean Model (MICOM) as a first step to extend our knowledge of models' performances in studying the East Sea circulation. The two models have fundamentally different numerical schemes and boundary conditions imposed on these models are not exactly the same each other. This study indicates that MICOM has a critical weak point in that it does not reproduce the shallow surface currents properly while it handles the thermohaline processes and associated movements of intermediate and deep waters efficiently. It is suggested that the mixed layer scheme needs to be modified so that it can match with inflow boundary conditions in order to reproduce the surface currents properly in MICOM. POM reproduces the surface current pattern better than MICOM, although the surface currents in POM appear to undergo the unrealistic seasonal variation and have exaggeratedly large vertical scale. These defects seem to arise during the process of adapting POM to the East Sea, and removing these defects is left as a future task.

• Proceedings of the Korean Association of Geographic Inforamtion Studies Conference
• /
• 2003.04a
• /
• pp.108-111
• /
• 2003

Altimeter data from the Topex/Poseidon (T/P) were analyzed to study the sea surface circulation and its variability in the North East Asian Seas. Long term averaged T/P sea level time series data where compared with in situ sea level measurements from a float-operated type tide gauge around of south Korea and Japan. Tf data are a large contaminated by 60-day tidal aliasing effect, very near the alias periods of M2 and S2. When this 60-day effect is removed, the data agree well with the tide gauge data with 4.6 cm averaged RMS difference. The T/P derived sea level variability reveals clearly the well-known, strong current-topography such as Kuroshio. The T/P mean sea level of North Pacific (NP) was higher than Yellow Sea (YS) and East Sea (ES). The T/P sea level variability, with strong eddy and meandering, was the largest in eastern part of Japan and this variability was mainly due to the influence of bottom topography in Kuroshio Extension area.

• Journal of Environmental Science International
• /
• v.13 no.8
• /
• pp.721-731
• /
• 2004

The dispersion of suspended particulates in the coastal complex terrain of mountain-inland basin (city)-sea, considering their recycling was investigated using three-dimensional non-hydrostatic numerical model and lagrangian particle model (or random walk model). Convective boundary layer under synoptic scale westerly wind is developed with a thickness of about I km over the ground in the west of the mountain, while a thickness of thermal internal boundary layer (TIBL) is only confined to less than 200m along the eastern slope of the mountain, below an easterly sea breeze circulation. At the mid of the eastern slop of the mountain, westerly wind confronts easterly sea breeze, which goes to the height of 1700 m above sea level and is finally eastward return flow toward the sea. At this time, particulates floated from the ground surface of the city to the top of TIBL go along the eastern slope of the mountain in the passage of sea breeze, being away the TIBL and reach near the top of the mountain. Then those particulates disperse eastward below the height of sea-breeze circulation and widely spread out over the coastal sea. Total suspended particulate concentration near the ground surface of the city is very low. On the other hand, nighttime radiative cooling produces a shallow nocturnal surface inversion layer (NSIL) of 200 m thickness over the inland surface, but relatively thin thickness less than 100m is found near the mountain surface. As synoptic scale westerly wind should be intensified under the association of mountain wind along the eastern slope of mountain to inland plain and further combine with land-breeze from inland plain toward sea, resulting in strong wind as internal gravity waves with a hydraulic jump motion bounding up to about 1km upper level in the atmosphere in the west of the city and becoming a eastward return flow. Simultaneously, wind near the eastern coastal side of the city was moderate. Since the downward strong wind penetrated into the city, the particulate matters floated near the top of the mountain in the day also moved down along the eastern slope of the mountain, reaching the. downtown and merging in the ground surface inside the NSIL with a maximum ground level concentration of total suspended particulates (TSP) at 0300 LST. Some of them were bounded up from the ground surface to the 1km upper level and the others were forward to the coastal sea surface, showing their dispersions from the coastal NSIL toward the propagation area of internal gravity waves. On the next day at 0600 LST and 0900 LST, the dispersed particulates into the coastal sea could return to the coastal inland area under the influence of sea breeze and the recycled particulates combine with emitted ones from the ground surface, resulting in relatively high TSP concentration. Later, they float again up to the thermal internal boundary layer, following sea breeze circulation.

• The Sea:JOURNAL OF THE KOREAN SOCIETY OF OCEANOGRAPHY
• /
• v.17 no.4
• /
• pp.225-242
• /
• 2012

This is the first attempt to produce simultaneous surface current field from satellite altimeter data for the entire East Sea and to provide surface current information to users with formal description. It is possible to estimate surface geostrophic current field in near real-time because satellite altimeters and coastal tide gauges supply sea level data for the whole East Sea. Strength and location of the major currents and meso-scale eddies can be identified from the estimated surface geostrophic current field. The mean locations of major surface currents were explicated relative to topographic, ocean-surface and undersea features with schematic representation of surface circulation. In order to demonstrate the practical use of this surface current information, exemplary descriptions of annual, seasonal and monthly mean surface geostrophic current distributions were presented. In order to objectively classify surface circulation patterns in the East Sea, empirical orthogonal function (EOF) analysis was performed on the estimated 16-year (1993-2008) surface current data. The first mode was associated with intensification or weakening of the East Korea Warm Current (EKWC) flowing northward along the east coast of Korea and of the anti-cyclonic circulation southwest of Yamato Basin. The second mode was associated with meandering paths of the EKWC in the southern East Sea with wavelength of 300 km. The first and second modes had inter-annual variations. The East Sea surface circulation was classified as inertial boundary current pattern, Tsushima Warm Current pattern, meandering pattern, and Offshore Branch pattern by the time coefficient of the first two EOF modes.

• Ocean and Polar Research
• /
• v.38 no.4
• /
• pp.271-286
• /
• 2016

We evaluate the temperature and salinity fields in the East Sea reproduced by the global ocean reanalysis data using HYbrid Coordinate Ocean Model (HYCOM for short). Temporal correlation of Sea Surface Temperature (SST) change between HYCOM and the Group for High Resolution Sea Surface Temperature (GHRSST) are higher in summer than winter. Though distributions of temperature and salinity in the HYCOM are similar to those from historical data (World Ocean Atlas 2013 V2), salinity in the HYCOM is lower (highter) in the region where the salinity is high (low). Temperature fields in the Ulleung basin of HYCOM are quite similar to those derived from Pressure-recording Inverted Echo Sounder (PIES), such as the correlation coefficient is higher than 0.7. This indicates that the HYCOM represents well the circulation and meso-scale phenomena in the Ulleung basin.

• Ocean and Polar Research
• /
• v.25 no.3
• /
• pp.287-302
• /
• 2003

The seasonal variations in the circulation of the water mass in the East Sea/Japan Sea have been simulated using a free surface primitive ocean model, RIAMOM (RIAM Ocean Model), comparing the results from GFDL-MOM1 (Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory Modular Ocean Model, version 1.1, hereafter MOM) with the GDEM (Generalized Digital Environmental Model) data. Both models appear to successfully reproduce the distinct features of circulation in the East Sea/Japan Sea, such as the NB (Nearshore Branch) flowing along the Japanese coast, the EKWC (East Korean Warm Current) flowing northward along the Korean coast, and the NKCC/LCC (North Korean Cold Current/Liman Cold Current) flowing southwestward along Korean/Russian coast. RIAMOM has shown better performance, compared to MOM, in terms of the realistic simulation of the flow field in the East Sea/Japan Sea; RIAMOM has produced more rectified flows on the coastal region, for example, the narrower and stronger NKCC/LCC than MOM has. There is however obvious differences between the model results and the GDEM data in terms of the calculation of the water mass; both models have shown a tendency to overpredict temperature and underpredict salinity below 50m; more diffusive forms of thermocline and halocline have been simulated than noted in GDEM data.