Baroclinic eddy restratification strongly influences the ocean’s general circulation and tracer budgets, and has been routinely parameterized via the Gent–McWilliams (GM) scheme in coarse-resolution ocean climate models. These parameterizations have been improved via refinements of the GM eddy transfer coefficient using eddy-resolving simulations and theoretical developments. However, previous efforts have focused primarily on the open ocean, and the applicability of existing GM parameterization approaches to continental slopes remains to be addressed. In this study, we use a suite of eddy-resolving, process-oriented simulations to test scaling relationships between eddy buoyancy diffusivity, mean flow properties, and topographic geometries in simulations of baroclinic turbulence over continental slopes. We focus on the case of retrograde (i.e., opposing the direction of topographic wave propagation) winds, a configuration that arises commonly around the margins of the subtropical gyres.

Three types of scalings are examined, namely, the GEOMETRIC framework developed by Marshall et al. (2012), a new ”Cross-Front” (CF) scaling derived via dimensional arguments, and the mixing length theory (MLT)-based scalings tested recently by Jansen et al. (2015) over a flat ocean bed. The present study emphasizes the crucial role of the local slope parameter, defined as the ratio between the topographic slope and the depth-averaged isopycnal slope, in controlling the nonlinear eddy buoyancy fluxes. Both the GEOMETRIC framework and the CF scaling can reproduce the depth-averaged eddy buoyancy transfer across alongshore-uniform continental slopes, for suitably chosen constant prefactors. Generalization of these scalings across both continental slope and open ocean environments requires the introduction of prefactors that depend on the local slope parameter via empirically derived analytical functions. In contrast, the MLT-based scalings fail to quantify the eddy buoyancy transfer across alongshore-uniform continental slopes when constant prefactors are adopted, but can reproduce the cross-slope eddy flux when the prefactors are adapted via empirical functions of the local slope parameter. Application of these scalings in prognostic ocean simulations also depends on an accurate representation of standing eddies associated with the topographic corrugations of the continental slope. These findings offer a basis for extending existing approaches to parameterizing transient eddies, and call for future efforts to parameterize standing eddies in coarse-resolution ocean climate models.

The Antarctic Slope Current (ASC) is a coherent circulation feature that rings the Antarctic continental shelf and regulates the flow of water toward the Antarctic coastline. The structure and variability of the ASC influences key processes near the Antarctic coastline that have global implications, such as the melting of Antarctic ice shelves and water mass formation that determines the strength of the global overturning circulation. Recent theoretical, modeling, and observational advances have revealed new dynamical properties of the ASC, making it timely to review. Earlier reviews of the ASC focused largely on local classifications of water properties of the ASC’s primary front. Here we instead provide a classification of the current’s frontal structure based on the dynamical mechanisms that govern both the along-slope and cross-slope circulation; these two modes of circulation are strongly coupled, similar to the Antarctic Circumpolar Current. Highly variable motions, such as dense overflows, tides, and eddies are shown to be critical components of cross-slope and cross-shelf exchange, but understanding of how the distribution and intensity of these processes will evolve in a changing climate remains poor due to observational and modeling limitations. Results linking the ASC to larger modes of climate variability, such as El Niño, show that the ASC is an integral part of global climate. An improved dynamical understanding of the ASC is still needed to accurately model and predict future Antarctic sea ice extent, the stability of the Antarctic ice sheets, and the Southern Ocean’s contribution to the global carbon cycle.

Almost all heat reaching the bases of Antarctica's ice shelves originates from warm Circumpolar Deep Water in the open Southern Ocean. This study quantifies the roles of mean and transient flows in transporting heat across almost the entire Antarctic continental slope and shelf using an ocean/sea ice model run at eddy- and tide-resolving (1/48°) horizontal resolution. Heat transfer by transient flows is approximately attributed to eddies and tides via a decomposition into time scales shorter than and longer than 1 day, respectively. It is shown that eddies transfer heat across the continental slope (ocean depths greater than 1,500 m), but tides produce a stronger shoreward heat flux across the shelf break (ocean depths between 500 m and 1,000 m). However, the tidal heat fluxes are approximately compensated by mean flows, leaving the eddy heat flux to balance the net shoreward heat transport. The eddy-driven cross-slope overturning circulation is too weak to account for the eddy heat flux. This suggests that isopycnal eddy stirring is the principal mechanism of shoreward heat transport around Antarctica, though likely modulated by tides and surface forcing.

Mesoscale eddies are ubiquitous in the ocean and play a key role in exchanges across continental slopes. In this study the properties of wind-driven baroclinic turbulence are investigated using eddy-resolving process simulations, focusing on the case of retrograde winds that arises around the margins of the subtropical gyres. In contrast to a flat-bottomed ocean, over steep slopes eddies develop from baroclinic instabilities are confined to the top few hundred meters. Deeper in the water column baroclinic instability and vertical momentum transfer are suppressed, so wind-input momentum is exported toward the open ocean by eddies before traversing down to the ocean bed. Close to the sloping topography, eddy energy sourced from the upper ocean is converted to potential energy, steepening isopycnals and driving bottom-trapped prograde flows. This process is associated with upgradient lateral buoyancy fluxes and downgradient isopycnal potential vorticity fluxes, and cannot be reproduced via linear stability calculations.

These properties of wind-driven shelf/slope turbulence are contrasted against simulations with flat bathymetry. The key differences described above hinge on the flow close to the steep topographic slope, which may be sensitive to the model’s vertical coordinate system. The simulations are therefore replicated using models that employ geopotential coordinates, terrain-following coordinates, and isopycnal coordinates. Quantitative inter-model discrepancies in the momentum and energy budgets are much more pronounced in the presence of a steep bottom slope. However, the key findings of this study are consistent across the models, suggesting that they are robust and warrant incorporation into parameterizations of eddy transfer across continental slopes.

Paleoclimate proxy data suggest that the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) was shallower at the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) than its preindustrial (PI) depth. Previous studies have suggested that this shoaling necessarily accompanies Antarctic sea ice expansion at the LGM. Here the influence of Southern Ocean surface forcing on the AMOC depth is investigated using ocean‐only simulations from a state‐of‐the‐art climate model with surface forcing specified from the output of previous coupled PI and LGM simulations. In contrast to previous expectations, we find that applying LGM surface forcing in the Southern Ocean and PI surface forcing elsewhere causes the AMOC to shoal only about half as much as when LGM surface forcing is applied globally. We show that this occurs because diapycnal mixing renders the Southern Ocean overturning circulation more diabatic than previously assumed, which diminishes the influence of Southern Ocean surface buoyancy forcing on the depth of the AMOC.