The thermohaline structure and evolution of the deep waters in the Canada Basin, Arctic Ocean

Abstract

Below the sill depth (at about 2400 m) of the Alpha-Mendeleyev ridge complex, the waters of the Canada Basin (CB) of the Arctic Ocean are isolated, with a 14C isolation age of about 500 yr. The potential temperature θ decreases with depth to a minimum θ m≈−0.524°C near 2400 m, increases with depth through an approximately 300 m thick transition layer to θ h≈−0.514°C, and then remains uniform from about 2700 m to the bottom at 3200–4000 m. The salinity increases monotonically with depth through the deep θ m and transition layer from about 34.952 to about 34.956 and then remains uniform in the bottom layer. A striking staircase structure, suggestive of double-diffusive convection, is observed within the transition layer. The staircase structure is observed for about 1000 km across the basin and has been persistent for more than a decade. It is characterized by 2–3 mixed layers (10–60 m thick) separated by 2–16 m thick interfaces. Standard formulae, based on temperature and salinity jumps, suggest a double-diffusive heat flux through the staircase of about 40 mW m −2, consistent with the measured geothermal heat flux of 40–60 mW m −2. This is to be expected for a scenario with no deep-water renewal at present as we also show that changes in the bottom layer are too small to account for more than a small fraction of the geothermal heat flux. On the other hand, the observed interfaces between mixed layers in the staircase are too thick to support the required double-diffusive heat flux, either by molecular conduction or by turbulent mixing, as there is no evidence of sufficiently vigorous overturns within the interfaces. It therefore seems, that while the staircase structure may be maintained by a very weak heat flux, most of the geothermal heat flux is escaping through regions of the basin near lateral boundaries, where the staircase structure is not observed. The vertical eddy diffusivity required in these near-boundary regions is O(10 −3) m 2 s −1. This implies Thorpe scales of order 10 m. We observe what may be Thorpe scales of this magnitude in boundary-region potential temperature profiles, but cannot tell if they are compensated by salinity. The weak stratification of the transition layer means that the large vertical mixing rate implies a local dissipation rate of only O(10 −10) W kg −1, which is not ruled out by plausible energy budgets. In addition, we discuss an alternative scenario of slow, continuous renewal of the CB deep water. In this scenario, we find that some of the geothermal heat flux is required to heat the new water and vertical fluxes through the transition layer are reduced.