November 18

Dudley Chelton

These are just notes; this is not a transcript.

Dr. Chelton have a seminar before the meeting which he suggested I go to.

Notes from the Seminar

Sea Surface Height [SSH]/Altimeter data data used mostly. SWOT used along with QuikSCAT/SeaWinds was the data source.

Because of noise, data has to be filtered. This lowers the spatial resolution.

Notes from the Meeting

Q.1

Question: Are Eddies hard to find? Can they be found using Sea Surface Temperature [SST] imagery for example?

Eddies can't be found using imagery alone. Maybe some of the really big ones but SST is influenced by so many factors including wind, sun, etc. Eddies cause SST differences, not the other way around. We use [...] altimeter data in combination with other things to find and track Eddies.

It took about a year to make the model we use to find Eddies and then we improved it over the course of seven years.

Q.2

Question: What are some other phenomena that don't have a specific location and time that researchers are often looking for?

Oceanic Fronts -- Gradient fields about >10km

Who uses? Fisherman use these because they are where the fishes are at.

Q.3

Questions: Do researchers spend a lot of time looking for things? Would helping [Ocean] researchers find things be beneficial?

Yes, researchers spend years looking for things.

You'd have to pre-determine the shapes ahead of time, but since things in the ocean move around, it would be helpful if you didn't just look for ellipses, because often in front for example ellipses that curve around and keep going.