01220 - Physical Oceanography

Learning outcomes

At the end of the course the student will know the basic description of the physical structure of the oceans ans seas, the fundamental of dynamical oceanography, from open ocean to the coastal seas and from the mesoscales to the abyssal circulation. The student will know the primitive equations of the ocean general circulation, the air-sa interactions and the planetary boundary layer. He/she wil know the shallow water equations and the gravity wave solutions, the Ekman horizontal currents and the Ekman vertical velocity, both in the open ocean and in the coastal areas.The course will also illustrate the classical large scale circulation solutions for the wind driven circulation (Stommel, Munk, Pedlosky and Fofonoff) and it will be concldued by tides and the buoyancy driven circulation in the coastal aras.

Course contents

The course topics schematically are:

1. Structure of the general circulation and its general characteristics

2. The forcing of the ocean circulation: wind, heat and water fluxes at the air-sea interface

3. Primitive equations for the oceans

4. Reynolds theory of turbulence and physical parametrizations of turbulence

5. Classical viscous solutions and ‘law of the wall'

6. Boundary conditions for the ocean primitive equations

7. The Ekman currents: analytical solution

8. The Ekman transport and vertical velocity

9. Large scale circulation upwelling/downwelling processes

10. Vorticity in geophysical fluid dynamics

11. Wind driven general circulation: Sverdrup, Stommel and Pedlosky solutions

12. Shallow water equations

13. Gravity wave solutions for the shallow water equations: Poincare', Kelvin  (at the equator and mid-latitudes) and inertial waves

14. Non-dimensional quasigeostrophic analysis of the shallow water equations: Rossby waves

15. Rossby waves in a zonal current

16. El Nino Theory

17. Energy and enstrophy: oceanic vortices and quasigeostrophic turbulence

18. The Mediterranean Sea general circulation and ocean predictions

Readings/Bibliography

Main Text:

J.R.Apel, Principles of Ocean Physics, International Geophysics Series, Vol. 38, 1987
Selected chapters from:
Peixoto and Oort, Physics of Climate, American Intitute of Physics, 1992
Pickard and Emery, Descriptive Physical Oceanography, Pergamon Press, 1982

Notes from the Teacher

Teaching methods

Classroom lectures

Assessment methods

Oral exam

Teaching tools

Classroom lectures

Links to further information

http://www.sincem.unibo.it/en/personal-pinardi

Office hours

See the website of Nadia Pinardi

See the website of Marco Zavatarelli