Argo Profiling Floats

The Argo Programme with vertical temperature/salinity profiles of ~300-km resolution every 10 days is essential for research on the role of ocean circulation in climate variability and change. It provides a means of knowing regional heat and freshwater storage for the longer time-scales; and, combined with other measurements (moorings, XBT lines, satellite altimetry and ship-based hydrography), it provides the means to identify the transport of heat and fresh water by ocean currents. Argo data are also essential for operational oceanography and seasonal prediction. Examples of applications of data from the Argo Programme unique to the Indian Ocean include:

• DImprove understanding (and hence determine predictability) of the coupled ocean–atmosphere system.
• Study of the thin, low-salinity surface-layers and barrier-layers ( in Bay of Bengal and Indonesian Seas, for example), and how they affect the generation of sea-surface temperature.
• Study of the role of subduction and mode-water formation in meridional circulation variability and their interaction with other modes of Indian Ocean variability.

Principal investigators implementing the Argo Programme in the Indian Ocean: