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An ocean current is a continuous, directed movement of seawater generated by a number of forces acting upon the water, including wind, the Coriolis effect, breaking waves, cabbeling, and temperature and salinity differences. [1] Depth contours, shoreline configurations, and interactions with other currents influence a current's direction and ...
Marine currents can carry large amounts of water, largely driven by the tides, which are a consequence of the gravitational effects of the planetary motion of the Earth, the Moon and the Sun. Augmented flow velocities can be found where the underwater topography in straits between islands and the mainland or in shallows around headlands plays a major role in enhancing the flow velocities ...
Winds are the main source of energy for ocean circulation, and Ekman transport is a component of wind-driven ocean current. [1] Ekman transport occurs when ocean surface waters are influenced by the friction force acting on them via the wind.
The Ekman spiral is an arrangement of ocean currents: the directions of horizontal current appear to twist as the depth changes. [1] The oceanic wind driven Ekman spiral is the result of a force balance created by a shear stress force, Coriolis force and the water drag. This force balance gives a resulting current of the water different from ...
UNESCO mentions that the report in the first time "notes a growing scientific consensus that melting Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets, among other factors, may be slowing important ocean currents at both poles, with potentially dire consequences for a much colder northern Europe and greater sea-level rise along the U.S. East Coast." [23]
The Humboldt Current, also called the Peru Current, is a cold, low-salinity ocean current that flows north along the western coast of South America. [1] It is an eastern boundary current flowing in the direction of the equator , and extends 500–1,000 km (310–620 mi) offshore.
The first documented observations of an Ekman-like spiral in the ocean were made in the Arctic Ocean from a drifting ice floe in 1958. [10] More recent observations include (not an exhaustive list): The 1980 mixed layer experiment [11] Within the Sargasso Sea during the 1982 Long Term Upper Ocean Study [12]
An ocean current is generated by the forces such as breaking waves, temperature and salinity differences, wind, Coriolis effect, and tides caused by the gravitational pull of celestial bodies. In addition, the physical properties in a pycnocline driven by density gradients also affect the flows and vertical profiles in the ocean. These changes ...