A 3-D prognostic numerical model study of the Georges Bank ecosystem. Part I: physical model

Abstract

The influence of tidal forcing and tidal and wind mixing on circulation and stratification over Georges Bank and adjacent regions in the Gulf of Maine has been examined using the 3-D semi-implicit version of the Blumberg and Mellor (1987) primitive equation ocean-circulation model. The numerical domain covered the Gulf of Maine/Georges Bank region with an open boundary starting at the New Jersey coast and ending at the Nova Scotia coast, with increased spatial resolution over Georges Bank. Numerical experiments were conducted using both smoothed and non-smoothed high-resolution (15 s) bottom topography. The model was forced by specifying the M 2 elevation and phase on the open boundary, and several forms of the bottom roughness parameter z o were used. The model provided a reasonable simulation of the M 2 tidal elevations and currents. The model, when run as an initial value problem with early summer stratification, exhibited tidal mixing fronts around the 40–60 m isobath over Georges Bank and Nantucket Shoals, and 100-m isobath on Brown Bank. The formation of these tidal mixing fronts significantly enhanced the along-isobath tidal rectified current over Georges Bank and the other two shoal regions. A cool-water band developed within the frontal zone along the eastern and southern flanks of Georges Bank and Nantucket Shoal, and it became cooler owing to wind mixing and upwelling as a mean summer wind stress was added. Tidal mixing and turbulent dissipation varied in time asymmetrically over Georges Bank. Over Georges Bank, tidal mixing was generally characterized as a local 1-D balance between turbulent shear production and dissipation. The spatial structure of the tidal residual flow and local turbulent dissipation rate depended critically on the spatial resolution of the bottom topography and the spatial distribution of z 0. Analysis of the 3-D momentum balance and the residual flow over the center of Georges Bank indicates that earlier results based on a 2-D cross-bank model correctly captured the basic dynamics of stratified tidal rectification and tidal mixing in this idealized model setting.