Call for Papers:
Special Arctic Session at the Joint EGS-AGU-EUG 2003 Assembly
"The Pan-Arctic and Long-term Variability"
Nice, France
6-11 April 2003
More information about the meeting can be found at:
http://www.copernicus.org/egsagueug/index.html
Deadline for receipt of abstracts is 15 January 2003, 24:00 GMT.
Papers are solicited to the special session (OS5.02) on "The Pan-Arctic
and Long-term Variability" at the Joint EGS-AGU-EUG in Nice, France,
06-11 April, 2003. This session will be coordinated within the OS5 "High
Latitudes" session together with OS5.01: Ice covered and High Latitude
Oceans, and CL2.05: Climate of the Polar regions (co-sponsored by OS and
CR, and including a special workshop on winter convection in the
Greenland and Labrador Seas).
The absolute deadline for receipt of abstracts is January 15, 2003,
24:00 GMT. Abstracts should be submitted through the following EGS
website:
http://www.copernicus.org/EGS/egsga/nice03/abstract_submission_txt_new.
htm
Session OS5.02:
Pan-Arctic and Long-term Variability
During the last several decades the Arctic Ocean has been undergoing
striking large-scale changes, suggesting that this region is a highly
variable system with major regime shifts taking place at time scales
ranging from several years to decades. Some of the critical
environmental aspects of these changes include a strengthening of the
Atlantic Water inflow through Fram Strait and its overflow into the
Canadian Basin, as revealed by in situ observations, and a significant
reduction of the perennial ice cover documented from remote sensing
data. Independent of remote sensing observations, submarine and other
data collected over the past decades have indicated a significant
thinning of the mean sea ice thickness over large regions of the central
Arctic in the 1990s. One of the scenarios predicted by global climate
models suggests an 80% decrease in the arctic perennial sea ice cover
within the next 50 years or so. Other observational and modeling studies
define at least two regimes in the arctic atmospheric circulation
(cyclonic versus anticyclonic) directly influencing sea ice conditions
and the freshwater and Atlantic Water distribution. Whether these
regimes result primarily from an oscillatory mode (i.e. Arctic
Oscillation) typical of the North Polar Vortex, or from a coupling with
lower latitudes (i.e. NAO) similar to the southern hemisphere ENSO, or
are they part of a trend related to global changes is yet to be
determined. In addition, significant regional differences can exist both
in the sign and the amplitude of a change, which might be due to the
space/time dependent anomaly distribution in the Arctic Ocean or
alternatively due to the decoupling of one region from another in
response to external forcing.
We invite contributions based on observations, analytical studies, and
numerical models concerned with regional- to basin-scale conditions of
the Arctic Ocean environment and its long term variability.
Presentations on integration of various data sets concerned with the
Arctic Ocean environment, model-data syntheses, and model
intercomparisons are welcome. Papers on the following topics are
especially encouraged:
1. Recent decadal changes and future predictions of the Arctic Pack Ice
conditions
2. Large scale circulation and water mass transformation in relation to
heat and salt/freshwater fluxes in and out of the Arctic Ocean,
including use of models and tracers
3. The role of the Arctic Ocean ventilation in the global thermohaline
circulation at long time scales (decadal to centennial).
4. The long-term Pan-Arctic variability from a perspective of the large
scale atmospheric weather patterns
Finally, papers on new definitions and monitoring of marine
environmental changes in the Pan-Arctic region will be also considered.
Conveners:
Jean-Claude Gascard
Universite Pierre et Marie Curie
LODYC/Tour 14-15, 4 place Jussieu
75252 PARIS cedex 05 FRANCE
Phone: 33 1 44 27 70 70
Fax: 33 1 44 27 38 05
Email: gascard [at] lodyc.jussieu.fr
Wieslaw Maslowski
Department of Oceanography
Naval Postgraduate School
Monterey, CA 93943, USA
Phone: 831-656-3162
Fax: 831-656-2712
Email: maslowsk [at] nps.navy.mil