Dynamic processes influencing the water mass characteristics and distribution

Interannual variability in the Western Mediterranean Sea with regard to physical and biogeochemical properties of the different water masses

Inverse box modelling for absolute geostrophic flow estimates in the Western Mediterranean Sea

Water and nutrients exchanges through the Sicily Strait

Figure 1: Absolute geostrophic velocities across 8 eight transects in the WMED and water trasports between different subbasins in the surface, intermediate and deep layers (see Schroeder et al, 2008, DSR I in Publications).

Abrupt changes in the thermhaline properties of the deep Western Mediterranean Sea:

• basin-wide propagation
• contribution to the Mediterranean Outflow through Gibraltar
• relative importance of atmospheric forcings and hydrographic preconditioning

Relation to the propagation of the signal of a climatic event occurred during the '80s in the Eastern Mediterranean Sea, the Eastern Mediterranean Transient (EMT)

Influence of the EMT on the western water mass properties and on the deep water formation processes

Figure 2: Vertical distribution (below 1500 m depth) of potential temperature, salinity and dissolved oxygen along a zonal transect from Gibraltar (on the left) to the Tyrrhenian entrance (on the right) in (a) 2004, (b) 2005 and (c) 2006. Below: the depth of the 33.475 sigma₁₀₀₀ isopycnal in 2004, 2005 and 2006 (see Schroeder et al., 2008, GRL in Publications)