AGU Chapman Conference on the Agulhas System and its Role in Changing Ocean Circulation, Climate, and Marine Ecosystems

该奖项将为将于2012年10月8日至12日在南非西开普省举行的关于阿古拉斯系统的查普曼会议提供部分支持。查普曼会议是由美国地球物理联合会主办的专题会议，旨在促进讨论大型会议通常没有的科学问题的机会。预计将有125人参加10月份的会议，其中包括资深科学家、职业中期科学家、博士后研究人员和学生。阿古拉斯系统在全球海洋环流和气候中发挥着重要作用。来自印度洋的海水流入大西洋，作为非洲南端海洋间交换的一部分。目前在人为强迫下，这种所谓的阿古尔哈斯泄漏的持续增加可能会加强大西洋的全球翻转环流，而据预测，北大西洋的变暖和加速的融水输入将削弱全球翻转环流。然而，与北大西洋的过程相比，阿古拉系统在很大程度上被忽视了，因为它是气候变化的潜在触发或稳定器。在区域尺度上，阿古拉影响极端天气事件，而南部非洲的年际降水变化与阿古拉系统的冷暖异常有关，与印度洋气候模式有关。该区域的大型海洋生态系统以及大型中上层物种及其渔业的分布也受到物理阿古拉系统变化的影响，其影响方式尚不为人所知。本次查普曼会议的目的是找出最紧迫的问题，并结合古海洋学和(持续的)现代观测设计模拟实验，以确定阿古拉系统从区域到全球的作用。

This award will provide partial support for a Chapman Conference on the Agulhas system that will be held 8-12 October 2012 in Western Cape, South Africa. Chapman Conferences are topic meetings sponsored by the American Geophysical Union and are designed to promote opportunities to discuss scientific issues that are not normally available at larger meetings. Attendance at the October conference is expected to be on the order of 125 participants to include senior scientists, midcareer scientists, postdoctoral researchers, and students.The Agulhas System plays a significant role in the global ocean circulation and climate.Warm, saline waters from the Indian Ocean flow into the Atlantic as part of the interoceanexchange around the southern tip of Africa. Ongoing increases in this so-called AgulhasLeakage, presently under anthropogenic forcing, could strengthen the global overturningcirculation in the Atlantic at a time when warming and accelerated meltwater input in the NorthAtlantic are predicted to weaken it. However compared to processes in the North Atlantic, theAgulhas system has been largely ignored as a potential trigger or stabilizer of climate variability.At regional scales the Agulhas influences extreme weather events while interannualrainfall variations in southern Africa are correlated with warm and cold anomalies in the Agulhassystem, associated with the Indian Ocean climate modes. Large Marine Ecosystems in the regionand the distribution of large pelagic species and their fisheries are also influenced by variationsin the physical Agulhas system in an as yet poorly known manner.The purpose of this Chapman Conference is to identify the most pressing questions and to designmodeling experiments in combination with paleoceanographic and (sustained) modernobservations to establish the role of the Agulhas system from regional to global scales.