No abstract

In recent decades, the Arctic has been warming and sea ice disappearing. By contrast, the Southern Ocean around Antarctica has been (mainly) cooling and sea-ice extent growing. We argue here that interhemispheric asymmetries in the mean ocean circulation, with sinking in the northern North Atlantic and upwelling around Antarctica, strongly influence the sea-surface temperature (SST) response to anthropogenic greenhouse gas (GHG) forcing, accelerating warming in the Arctic while delaying it in the Antarctic. Furthermore, while the amplitude of GHG forcing has been similar at the poles, significant ozone depletion only occurs over Antarctica. We suggest that the initial response of SST around Antarctica to ozone depletion is one of cooling and only later adds to the GHG-induced warming trend as upwelling of sub-surface warm water associated with stronger surface westerlies impacts surface properties. We organize our discussion around ‘climate response functions’ (CRFs), i.e. the response of the climate to ‘step’ changes in anthropogenic forcing in which GHG and/or ozone-hole forcing is abruptly turned on and the transient response of the climate revealed and studied. Convolutions of known or postulated GHG and ozone-hole forcing functions with their respective CRFs then yield the transient forced SST response (implied by linear response theory), providing a context for discussion of the differing warming/cooling trends in the Arctic and Antarctic. We speculate that the period through which we are now passing may be one in which the delayed warming of SST associated with GHG forcing around Antarctica is largely cancelled by the cooling effects associated with the ozone hole. By mid-century, however, ozone-hole effects may instead be adding to GHG warming around Antarctica but with diminished amplitude as the ozone hole heals. The Arctic, meanwhile, responding to GHG forcing but in a manner amplified by ocean heat transport, may continue to warm at an accelerating rate.

differences in the models' climatological thermal ocean stratification in the region of seasonal sea ice around Antarctica. Exploiting this relationship, we use observational data for the time-mean meridional and vertical temperature gradients to constrain the real Southern Ocean response to SAM on fast and slow timescales.

Combining satellite altimetry with Argo profile data a systematic observational estimate of mesoscale eddy signatures in surface mixed‐layer depth (MLD) is provided across the Southern Ocean (SO). Eddy composite MLD anomalies are shallow in cyclones, deep in anticyclones, and increase in magnitude with eddy amplitude. Their magnitudes show a pronounced seasonal modulation roughly following the depth of the climatological mixed layer. Weak eddies of the relatively quiescent SO subtropics feature peak late‐winter perturbations of ±10 m. Much larger MLD perturbations occur over the vigorous eddies originating along the Antarctic Circumpolar Current (ACC) and SO western boundary current systems, with late‐winter peaks of −30 m and +60 m in the average over cyclonic and anticyclonic eddy cores (a difference of ≈ 100 m). The asymmetry between modest shallow cyclonic and pronounced deep anticyclonic anomalies is systematic and not accompanied by corresponding asymmetries in eddy amplitude. Nonetheless, the net deepening of the climatological SO mixed layer by this asymmetry in eddy MLD perturbations is estimated to be small (few meters). Eddies are shown to enhance SO MLD variability with peaks in late winter and eddy‐intense regions. Anomalously deep late‐winter mixed layers occur disproportionately within the cores of anticyclonic eddies, suggesting the mesoscale heightens the frequency of deep winter surface‐mixing events along the eddy‐intense regions of the SO. The eddy modulation in MLD reported here provides a pathway via which the oceanic mesoscale can impact air‐sea fluxes of heat and carbon, the ventilation of water masses, and biological productivity across the SO.