Shelf Sea Oceanography

The working group Shelf Sea Oceanography and oceanographic process studies deals with numerical simulation of dynamics in shelf seas or at continental slopes of the world ocean. The main areas of interest are the North Sea and the Northwest European Shelf, the Baltic Sea, Arctic Shelf Seas and the Northeast Atlantic.

Main research topics are:

• ocean dynamics (wind driven or density driven currents, tides, mixing processes),
• climate relevant processes (ocean-atmosphere exchange, ice formation, convection, deep water formation) and
• transport dynamics (dispersion of dissolved or particulate material in the water column

The present work concentrates on the development and maintenance of mathematical models of various types which are either applied to certain areas as regional, mesoscale models or used as process models in order to investigate single features like open ocean convection or bottom water formation.

The department is also involved in biological studies dealing with fish egg / larvae drift or with the influence of convection on the primary production. Field experiments are carried out which serve as an important basis not only for the model forcing but also for evaluation and verification of model results.)

The group is headed by Prof. Dr. Jan Backhaus. For further information on the department please contact: jan.backhaus(at)uni-hamburg.de(jan.backhaus"AT"zmaw.de)