Abstract
Environmental conditions such as temperature, planktonic biomass, and ocean currents play an important role in the development and distribution of marine species. This work aims to estimate, in a high spatial resolution, the actual trends of sea surface temperature (SST) and chlorophyll-a concentration (Chl-a) and to assess the relationship with the local hydrodynamic conditions in the Alborán Sea. To investigate these objectives, time series of SST and Chl-a of satellite sensor data were analyzed during 20 years from January 2001 to December 2020, using the Seasonal-Trend-Loess (STL) decomposition method and the Mann-Kendall seasonality test. The results, obtained with a 95% of confidence, showed that the Alborán Sea basin is subject to sea surface warming evaluated at 0.027 ± 0.008 ° C per year, related to the warming of the Atlantic water mass, which contributes to a decrease of productivity evaluated at -0.0024 ± 0.0003 μg /l per year of Chl-a concentration. These trends are not homogeneous over the entire basin area but show a large regional variation between different parts of the Alborán Sea due to the hydrodynamic process of the Atlantic Jet - Western Alboran Gyre system (AJ-WAG), which is more active especially in summer/autumn seasons and contribute largely to these changes by mixing the waters of the Atlantic Ocean and the Mediterranean Sea.
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a callDisclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.
