• Journal of the Korean earth science society
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• v.36 no.7
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• pp.611-616
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• 2015

El Nino and Southern Oscillation (ENSO) presents a broad band (2-8 year) variability and slowly changing amplitude and period, which are respectively referred to as ENSO irregularity and ENSO modulation. In this study, we developed a nonlinear low-order climate model by combining the Lorenz-63 model of nonlinear atmospheric variability and a simple ENSO model with recharge oscillator characteristics. The model successfully reproduced the ENSO-like variations in the sea surface temperature of eastern Pacific, such as the peak period, wide periodicity, and decadal modulations. The results show that the chaotic atmospheric forcing can lead to ENSO irregularity and ENSO modulation. It is also suggested the high probability of La Nina development could be associated with strong convection of the western warm pool. Although it is simple, this model is expected to be used in research on long-term climate change because it well captures the nonlinear air-sea interactions in the equatorial Pacific.

• Korean Journal of Remote Sensing
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• v.37 no.3
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• pp.615-625
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• 2021

The coastal areas around Palau Island and Tonga Island, near the Pacific equator, consist of coral reefs, mangrove and seaweed. In particular, understanding the optical properties of sea surface water in coral reef habitats helps improve the accuracy of remote sensing based habitat mapping and identify tropical ecosystem characteristics. Here, we collected spectral characteristics of sea surface water of Palau Island and Tonga Island and analyzed the concentration of suspended matters, absorption coefficient, and remote sensing reflectance to understand the seawater characteristics of the coral reef habitats. Based on the results of the suspended matter concentration analysis, we developed and verified an empirical algorithm to derive the concentration from satellite data using remote sensing reflectance of three bands, 555, 625, 660 nm, showed a high determinant coefficient, 0.98. In conclusion, coral reef habitats in tropical regions are characterized by CASE-I water in terms of the marine optics with oligotrophic properties, and require monitoring using continuous collection and analysis of field data.

• Atmosphere
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• v.24 no.2
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• pp.141-150
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• 2014

This study investigates the characteristics of the Gross Moist Stability (GMS) over the tropics. The GMS summarizes the relationship between large-scale entropy forcing due to radiation and surface fluxes and the response of smaller-scale convection. The GMS is able to explain both to where moist entropy is advected by the atmospheric circulation and how deep the moisture flux convergence is in the tropical region. In the deep convective region, positive GMS appears over the warm pool region due to the strong column-integrated moisture convergence and the ensuing export of moist entropy to the environment. The vertical advection of moist entropy dominates over the horizontal advection in this region. Meanwhile, over the eastern tropical ITCZ region, which is characterized by shallow convective area, import of moist entropy by horizontal winds is dominant compared to the vertical moist entropy advection. Future changes in the GMS are also examined using the 22 CMIP5 model simulations. A decrease in the GMS appears widely across the tropics, but its increase occurs over the western-central equatorial Pacific. It is evident that the increased GMS region corresponds to an increased region of precipitation, implying that strengthened convection in the future due to increased entropy forcing exports the enhanced moist energy to stabilize the environment.

• Journal of the Korean earth science society
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• v.28 no.5
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• pp.545-555
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• 2007

Ocean general circulation model developed by GFDL on the basis of MOM4 of FMS are examined and evaluated in order to elucidate the global ocean status. The model employs a tripolar grid system to resolve the Arctic Ocean without polar filtering. The meridional resolution gradually increases from $1/3^{\circ}$ at the equator to $1^{\circ}$ at $30^{\circ}N(S)$. Other horizontal grids have the constant $1^{\circ}$ and vertical grids with 50 levels. The ocean is also coupled to the GFDL sea ice model. It considers tidal effects along with fresh water and chlorophyll concentration. This model is integrated for a 100 year duration with 96 cpu forced by German OMIP and CORE dataset. Levitus, WOA01 climatology, serial CTD observations, WOCE and Argo data are all used for model validation. General features of the world ocean circulation are well simulated except for the western boundary and coastal region where strong advection or fresh water flux are dominant. However, we can find that information concerning chlorophyll and sea ice, newly applied to MOM4 as surface boundary condition, can be used to reduce a model bias near the equatorial and North Pacific ocean.

• The Sea:JOURNAL OF THE KOREAN SOCIETY OF OCEANOGRAPHY
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• v.4 no.4
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• pp.323-337
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• 1999

Seafloor morphology and manganese nodule occurrence were studied in the Korea Deep-sea Environmental Study (KODES) area, northeast equatorial Pacific, to understand their relationship. Study area is composed of three elongated valleys and hills with about 100~200 m height along NNE-SSW direction. Valley region is generally flat. However, hill region is very rugged with big cliffs of about 100m height and small depressions of several tens of meters depth. Tectonic movement along the Clarion-Clipperton fracture zone, consequent formation of elongated abyssal hills and Valleys, erosion of siliceous bottom sediments by bottom currents, and dissolution of carbonate sediments on the abyssal hills below CCD result in the rugged morphology. Manganese nodule occurrence is closely related to the morphology of the study area; mostly rounded-shaped manganese nodules with about 5 cm diameter are abundant on the flat valley region, whereas irregular shaped nodules (or manganese crust) with less than 5 cm to about 1 m diameter occur on the hill. These results supports the previous reports that nodule abundance, composition, and morphology are variable both on regional and local small scales on the seafloor even within some abundant nodule provinces depending on oceanographic characteristics such as bathymetric features, surface sediment type, sediment thickness, and so on. We suggest that such oceanographic characteristics affect interrelatedly on the formation of manganese nodules, and tectonic movement of the Pacific plate ultimately constrain the nodule occurrence. A potential mining place in the KODES area seems to be the valley region, which is elongated to the NNW-SSE direction with 3-4 km width.

• Economic and Environmental Geology
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• v.39 no.6 s.181
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• pp.739-752
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• 2006

Deep-sea surface sediments acquired by multiple corer from 69 stations in the Clarion-Clipperton fracture zone of the northeast equatorial Pacific, were examined to understand the correlation of mass physical properties and sedimen-tological processes. The seabed of the middle part ($8-12^{\circ}N$) of the study area is mainly covered by biogenic siliceous sediment compared with pelagic red clays in the northern part ($16-17^{\circ}N$). In the southern part ($5-6^{\circ}N$), water depth is shallower than carbonate compensation depth (CCD). The mass physical properties such as grain size distribution, mean grain size, water content, specific grain density, wet bulk density, void ratio, and porosity of sediments are distinctly different among the three parts of the study area. Surface sediments in northern part are characterized by fine grain size and low water contents possibly due to low primary productivity and high detrital input. Conversely, sediments in the middle part are characterized by coarse grain size and high water contents, which might be caused by high surface productivity and deeper depth than CCD. The sediments show low water contents and high density in the southern part, which can be explained by shallower depth than CCD. Our results suggest that the variations in mass physical properties of sediments are influenced by combined effects including biogenic primary productivity of surface water, water depth, especially with respect to CCD, sedimentation rate, detrital input, and the geochemistry of the bottom water (for example, formation of authigenic clay minerals and dissolution of biogenic grains).

• Korean Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences
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• v.20 no.4
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• pp.360-369
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• 1987

The relationship between the catches of tuna and hydrographic conditions in South-East Pacific region (latitude $5^{\circ}N-12^{\circ}S$, longitude $135^{\circ}W-115^{\circ}W$) was investigated by using the catch data of tuna and Digital Bathythermograph (DBT) data from December 9, 1980 to April 2, 1981. The results are as follows : The study area were located in South Eguatorial Current regions including equatorial upwelling regions in $5^{\circ}N\;to\;12^{\circ}S$. The horizontal mean temperature at the depth of 10m on the first quarter months in the study area was about $25^{\circ}C$C and the salinity of those fishing areas ranged from 34.8 to $35.0\%_{\circ}$. Yellowfin tuna and bigeye tuna were mainly caught in SW vertical temperature profile type, which the depth of thermocline ranged from loom to 300m, and temperature difference of thermocline was about $12^{\circ}C$. The deeper the depth of thermocline, the more the catches of tuna. While albacore tuna was caught well in SS vertical temperature profile type which the temperature of thermocline ranged from $9^{\circ}\;to\;26^{\circ}C$ and its gradient was very smooth. The depth of 1 ml/l surface of dissoved oxygen content ranged from loom to 200m in the South-East Pacific between longitude $140^{\circ}W-100^{\circ}W$, but it was shallower than 100 m near the North-South American continent. The catches of bigeye tuna were larger than those of yellowfin tuna in South Equatorial Current region. As approaching to the South and North American continent, the catches of yellowfin tuna and bigeye tuna decreased because the thermocline becomes shallower and steeper and the depth of the 1 m1/1 surface of dissolved oxygen content became shallower.

• The Sea:JOURNAL OF THE KOREAN SOCIETY OF OCEANOGRAPHY
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• v.13 no.3
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• pp.168-177
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• 2008

Trafficablility of a miner and potential environmental impacts due to mining activities should be considered in the selection of a commercial manganese nodule mining site. These two factors can be evaluated comparatively with physical properties and shear strength of sea-bed sediments. For the qualitative comparison of potential minig sites in terms of these two factors, physical properties such as water contents, void ratios, porosities, and grain densities, and shear strengths of surface sediments were determined for the three potential manganese nodule mining sites(KR1, KR2, and KR5) in the Korean manganese nodule contract area, northeast Pacific. For the study, sediment samples were collected from 107 stations from 2004 to 2006. The physical properties of surface sediments showed more significant differences between northern(KR1, KR2) and southern(KR5) blocks than between northern blocks(KR1 vs. KR2). Water content, void ratio, and porosity of sediments from KR5 were relatively higher than those from KR1 and KR2. Grain density of sediments from KR5 was relatively lower than those from KR1 and KR2. Shear strengths of the top 10cm sediments were higher in KR1 and KR2, whereas those of the deeper part were highest in KR5 block. Generally, sediments of high water contents are less suspendible than those of the low water contents by benthic disturbances, thus less disturbance is expected in the sediments of high water content by mining activities. In terms of trafficability, the shear strength of sediment below 10 cm deep is more important than shallower part because miner will disturb at least top 10 cm interval of the surface sediments. Base on these results, we conclude that KR5 area will be the best site for commercial mining among three investigated sites in this study.

• The Sea:JOURNAL OF THE KOREAN SOCIETY OF OCEANOGRAPHY
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• v.13 no.3
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• pp.178-189
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• 2008

The distribution of inorganic nutrients and their remineralization ratio in the divergence zone ($7^{\circ}{\sim}10.5^{\circ}N$) of the northeastern Pacific were investigated from July 2003 to July 2007. A divergence zone along the boundary of the North Equatorial Counter Current (NECC) and North Equatorial Current (NEC) at $10^{\circ}N$ was observed in July 2007 when the La Nina event and divergence-related upwelling was strong. The mean depth of oligotrophic surface mixed layer in the divergence zone was 46, 61, and 30 m in July 2003, August 2005, and July 2007, respectively. Below the surface mixed layer, a nutricline was clearly observed. The depth integrated value of nitrate including nitrite (DIVn) in the upper layer($0{\sim}100$ m depth) ranged from 5.51 to 21.71 $gN/m^2$(mean 12.82 $gN/m^2$) in July 2003, from 5.62 to 8.46 $gN/m^2$ (mean 7.15 $gN/m^2$) in August 2005, and from 8.98 to 27.80 $gN/m^2$(mean 21.12 $gN/m^2$) in July 2007. The maximum DIVn was observed at the divergence zone. The distributions of phosphate(DIVp) and silicate(DIVsi) were similar to that of DIVn and the DIVn/DIVsi ratio was $0.87{\pm}0.11$ in the upper layer. The limiting nutrient for phytoplankton growth in the study area was identified as nitrogen(N/P ratio=14.6). The nitrate (including nitrite) concentrations were lower in the region mainly affected by NEC than in the region affected by NECC. The study area of low silicate concentrations was also considered to be Si-limiting environment. The remineralization ratios of nutrients were $P/N/-O_2=1/14.6{\pm}1.1/100.4{\pm}8.8(23.44{\leq}Sigma-{\theta}{\leq}26.38)$ in the study area. These ratios suggested remineralization process in the surface layer of divergence zone.

• Economic and Environmental Geology
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• v.45 no.5
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• pp.477-486
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• 2012

High-resolution bathymetry and physico-chemical properties of manganese nodules were explored to identify the relationship between morphological features and nodule occurrences in the KR1, one of the Korean contract nodule fields located in the NE Pacific. The high-resolution seabed mapping showed that the southwestern sector of the KR1 (KR1-1) was relatively deeper than the northeastern sector (KR1-2) which is occupied by small-scale seamounts. In terms of nodule occurrence, manganese nodules in the KR1-1 were comparatively larger (2-4 cm) with rough surface (t-type) and discoidal shapes (D-type), while those in the KR1-2 were generally small (<2 cm) with smooth surface (s-type) and irregular shapes (I-type). In addition, the nodules in the KR1-1 had higher contents of Cu, Mn and Ni. Such connections of water depths to nodule appearances and metal contents are commonly observed in the Pacific nodule fields. On the other hand, the nodules in the KR1-2 tend to be controled by morphological features. The seamounts in the KR1-2 might continuously provide rock fragments as new nuclei of manganese nodules. As a result, the nodules could not grow over than 2 cm and showed the shapes of a newbie (i.e., smooth surface and irregular shapes). As a result, our observations indicate that occurrence features of manganese nodules could be subjected to water depths and seabed morphology simultaneously.