The Diapycnal and Isopycnal Mixing Experiment: A First Assessment

Abstract

Southern Ocean (DIMES) was designed as a multi-pronged US and UK CLIVAR effort to measure and to better understand diapycnal mixing and along-isopycnal eddy transport in the Antarctic Circumpolar Current (ACC), because these processes together appear to play a key role in the Merdional Overturning Circulation (MOC) (Gille et al., 2007). The project represents an unusual effort to evaluate simultaneously the roles of diapycnal and isopycnal mixing, and the program has benefited from close collaboration between observationalists, theoreticians and modelers. Fieldwork for DIMES began in early 2009, and the initial phase of the field observations is now wrapping up. This article provides a brief preliminary summary of early DIMES findings. The DIMES field program was centered around the 2009 release of 76 kg of trifluoromethyl sulfur pentafluoride, CF3SF5,