On mode water formation and erosion in the Arabian Sea: forcing mechanisms, regionality, and seasonality

Font, Estel; Swart, Sebastiaan; Vinayachandran, Puthenveettil Narayana; Queste, Bastien Y.

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/os-21-1349-2025

Articles | Volume 21, issue 4

https://doi.org/10.5194/os-21-1349-2025

© Author(s) 2025. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

https://doi.org/10.5194/os-21-1349-2025

© Author(s) 2025. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Articles | Volume 21, issue 4

Research article

|

14 Jul 2025

Research article |

| 14 Jul 2025

On mode water formation and erosion in the Arabian Sea: forcing mechanisms, regionality, and seasonality

Estel Font, Sebastiaan Swart, Puthenveettil Narayana Vinayachandran, and Bastien Y. Queste

Supplement

https://doi.org/10.5194/os-21-1349-2025-supplement

Data sets

MOM4p1-TOPAZ data used in the manuscript entitled "On Mode Water formation and erosion in the Arabian Sea: Forcing mechanisms, regionality, and seasonality" E. Font and P. N. Vinaychandran https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.14770956

Argo float data and metadata from Global Data Assembly Centre (Argo GDAC) Argo https://doi.org/10.17882/42182

GEBCO 2023 Grid GEBCO Compilation Group https://doi.org/10.5285/f98b053b-0cbc-6c23-e053-6c86abc0af7b

Model code and software

EstelFont/Mode_Water_Arabian_Sea: v1.0.0 E. Font https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.15834677

Short summary

Mode water is formed annually and sits between the warm surface water and deeper older waters. In the Arabian Sea, it plays a crucial role in regulating ocean heat and oxygen variability by acting as a doorway between the surface and deeper waters. Using observations and models, we show that its formation is primarily driven by atmospheric forcing, though ocean currents, eddies, and biological heating also influence its life cycle. This water mass contributes up to 40 % of the region's oxygen content.