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MEPS 268:31-41 (2004)
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Abstract
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Offshore phytoplankton biomass increase and its oceanographic causes in the South China Sea
DanLing Tang1,2,3,*, Hiroshi Kawamura3, Tran Van Dien4, MingAn Lee5
1LED, South China Sea Institute of Oceanology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 164 West Xingang Road, Guangzhou 510301, China
2Department of Environmental Science and Engeneering, Fudan University, Shanghai 200433, China
3Center for Atmospheric and Oceanic Studies, Graduate School of Science, Tohoku University, Sendai 980-8578, Japan
4Haiphong Institute of Oceanography, 246 Da Nang Street, Haiphong City 84-31, Vietnam
5Department of Environmental Biology and Fisheries Science, National Taiwan Ocean University, 2 Pei-Ning Road, Keelung 20224, Taiwan
*Email: lingzistdl@yahoo.com
ABSTRACT: High phytoplankton biomass often occurs in plumes near river mouths or in eutrophic coastal waters for short time periods. However, we observed an increased phytoplankton biomass in a narrow jet-shaped protrusion into the western South China Sea
(SCS) using satellite chlorophyll a (chl a) data from the Sea-viewing Wide Field-of-view Sensor (SeaWiFS) and concurrent ship measurements in 1999. In June, regional phytoplankton biomass appeared as a large jet shape extending from the
coastal waters of Vietnam eastward towards the SCS, about 200 km northeast of the mouth of the Mekong River; this feature intensified in the form of a large jet or gyre from July to September, decayed in October, and disappeared entirely in November. The
gyre was about 400 km in diameter with chl a concentrations from 0.5 to 2 mg m-3. Data on sea surface temperature (SST), winds, and sea surface height anomalies indicated a strong offshore upwelling during a period of strong
southwesterly winds alongshore. The upwelling coincided with the regional increase in phytoplankton biomass in terms of shape, timing, and location. We observed this phenomenon during every southwesterly monsoon season from 1997 to 2002 using chl a
images from 3 satellite ocean color sensors--SeaWiFS, Ocean Color and Temperature Scanner (OCTS), and Ocean Color Imager (OCI)--and it appeared to be related to the cross-shelf upwelling that delivers nutrients to surface waters. The phytoplankton then
flowed with a large anticyclonic gyre into the western SCS.
KEY WORDS: Phytoplankton · Chl a concentration · Upwelling · Monsoon · Satellite observation · SeaWiFS · South China Sea
Full text in pdf format
Published in MEPS Vol.
268
(2004) on March 9
Print ISSN: 0171-8630; Online ISSN: 1616-1599.
Copyright © Inter-Research, Oldendorf/Luhe, 2004
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