Constructing a Time Series for Southern Ocean Currents Using GRACE

The currents of the Southern Ocean connect to every ocean basin and distribute water between them, making these currents an important quantity to monitor and understand as they change over time. In situ instrumentation is difficult to deploy within this region, however these currents create bottom pressure signals at major bathymetric obstacles which are observable by the GRACE and GRACE Follow-On satellites. 

    In this study, we examine the relationships between the Antarctic Circumpolar Current and the Antarctic Bottom Water within the Southern Ocean and the bottom pressure gradients at the Kerguelen Plateau seamount and the Drake Passage sill using the high resolution Southern Ocean State Estimate. Then we use these relationships along with bottom pressure gradients from the RL05 and RL06 mascon solutions from the Center for Space Research at the University of Texas at Austin to develop a real-life time series of the two currents.