Automated eddy detection methods are fundamental tools to analyze eddy activity from the large datasets derived from satellite measurements and numerical model simulations. Existing methods are either based on the distribution of physical parameters usually computed from velocity derivatives or on the geometry of velocity streamlines around minima or maxima of sea level anomaly. A new algorithm was developed based exclusively on the geometry of the velocity vectors. Four constraints characterizing the spatial distribution of the velocity vectors around eddy centers were derived from the general features associated with velocity fields in the presence of eddies. The grid points in the domain for which these four constraints are satisfied are detected as eddy centers. Eddy sizes are computed from closed contours of the streamfunction field, and eddy tracks are retrieved by comparing the distribution of eddy centers at successive time steps. The results were validated against manually derived eddy fields. Two parameters in the algorithm can be modified by the users to optimize its performance. The algorithm is applied to both a high-resolution model product and highfrequency radar surface velocity fields in the Southern California Bight.

Oceanic mesoscale eddies contribute important horizontal heat and salt transports on a global scale. Here we show that eddy transports are mainly due to individual eddy movements. Theoretical and observational analyses indicate that cyclonic and anticyclonic eddies move westwards, and they also move polewards and equatorwards, respectively, owing to the b of Earth's rotation. Temperature and salinity (T/S) anomalies inside individual eddies tend to move with eddies because of advective trapping of interior water parcels, so eddy movement causes heat and salt transports. Satellite altimeter sea surface height anomaly data are used to track individual eddies, and vertical profiles from co-located Argo floats are used to calculate T/S anomalies. The estimated meridional heat transport by eddy movement is similar in magnitude and spatial structure to previously published eddy covariance estimates from models, and the eddy heat and salt transports both are a sizeable fraction of their respective total transports.

[1] The quantification of coastal connectivity is important for a wide range of real-world applications ranging from assessment of pollutant risk to nearshore fisheries management. For these purposes, coastal connectivity can be defined as the probability that water parcels from one location have advected to another site over a given time interval. Here we demonstrate how to quantify connectivity using Lagrangian probability-density functions (PDFs) based on numerical solutions of the coastal circulation of the Southern California Bight (SCB). Ensemble mean dispersal patterns from a single release site show strong dependencies on particle-release location, season, and year, reflecting annual and interannual circulation patterns in the SCB. Mean connectivity patterns are heterogeneous for the advection time of 30 days or less, due to local circulation patterns, and they become more homogeneous for longer advection times. However, connectivity patterns for a single realization are highly variable because of intrinsic eddy-driven transport and synoptic wind-forcing variability. In the long term, mainland sites are good sources while both Northern and Southern Channel Islands are poor sources, although they receive substantial fluxes of water parcels from the mainland. The predicted connectivity gives useful information to ecological and other applications for the SCB (e.g., designing marine protected areas and predicting the impact of a pollution event) and demonstrates how high-resolution numerical solutions of coastal ocean circulations can be used to quantify nearshore connectivity.

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Populations of many nearshore marine species are connected through the dispersal of their larvae. In this paper, larval connectivity patterns in the Southern California Bight are explored using 2 quantities: potential and realized larval connectivity. Potential connectivity is defined as the probability of larval transport from a source to a destination location and is quantified using Lagrangian particle simulations. Realized connectivity is the product of potential connectivity with larval production and can be used to estimate larval settlement patterns. Potential and realized connectivity patterns are quantified for kelp bass Paralabrax clathratus, kelp rockfish Sebastes atrovirens, and red abalone Haliotis rufescens, 3 species with a range of larval dispersal characteristics. Connectivity patterns were found to be both heterogeneous, with locations having different source and destination strengths, and asymmetric, with directionality in larval transport. Both potential and realized connectivity were strongly influenced by the length and timing of the spawning season as well as planktonic larval duration. For kelp bass and kelp rockfish, a strong correspondence was found between realized and potential destination locations, suggesting that circulation processes have a dominant role in shaping the spatial distribution of these 2 species. Strong temporal variability in realized larval connectivity was observed on seasonal and inter-annual time scales (particularly between El Niño and La Niña conditions). These results provide novel information for use in marine fisheries and conservation management.

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Density stratification and planetary rotation distinguish three-dimensional island wakes significantly from a classical fluid dynamical flow around an obstacle. A numerical model is used to study the formation and evolution of flow around an idealized island in deep water (i.e., with vertical island sides and surface-intensified stratification and upstream flow), focusing on wake instability, coherent vortex formation, and mesoscale and submesoscale eddy activity. In a baseline experiment with strong vorticity generation at the island, three types of instability are evident: centrifugal, barotropic, and baroclinic. Sensitivities are shown to three nondimensional parameters: the Reynolds number (Re), Rossby number (Ro), and Burger number (Bu). The dependence on Re is similar to the classical wake in its transition to turbulence, but in contrast the island wake contains coherent eddies no matter how large the Re value. When Re is large enough, the shear layer at the island is so narrow that the vertical component of vorticity is larger than the Coriolis frequency in the near wake, leading to centrifugal instability on the anticyclonic side. As Bu decreases the eddy size shrinks from the island breadth to the baroclinic deformation radius, and the eddy generation process shifts from barotropic to baroclinic instability. For small Ro values, the wake dynamics is symmetric with respect to cyclonic and anticyclonic eddies. At intermediate Ro and Bu values, the anticyclonic eddies are increasingly more robust than cyclonic ones as Ro/Bu increases, but for large Re and Ro values, centrifugal instability weakens the anticyclonic eddies while cyclonic eddies remain coherent.

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