Oceans and coastal zones
Observing, understanding and predicting ocean swell has been a focus on study in both China and Europe for climate, meteorology, environment and economy. To monitor at global scale ocean swell will improve the wind and wave forecast for marine meteorology (including extreme events), the ocean dynamics modeling and prediction, our knowledge of climate variability, and fundamental understandings on air-sea surface processes. And to monitor and map extreme events during typhoons (hurricanes) or storm surges we have to develop the use of multiple satellite wind, wave and sea level data for forecast. The Dragon projects have been providing an excellent opportunity for Chinese and European ocean research communities to utilize the spaceborne satellite remote sensing data from China, ESA and Third Party Missions (TPM) to actively monitoring ocean swell, wind and other relevant parameters. It is the purpose of this project to continue cutting edge research in synergistic exploitation ocean swell study at global scale and extreme events in coastal region and gain insight of the physical nature of these phenomena, which will lay a solid foundation as we move to operational oceanography. The purpose of the project includes: (1) investigate algorithms for advanced ocean products from multiple microwave satellite sensors together describing wind and wave at the storm event scale ; (2) develop high wind retrieval algorithm from cross-polarization SAR; (3) synergy with existing satellite missions monitoring ocean waves; (4) investigation on global swell climate based on long term series space-borne data. (5) assimilation studies of wind, waves and sea level in the context of hurricanes forecasts; (6) the influence of swell on the studies of coastal extremes; and (7) consistent analysis on winds, waves and storm surges in the context of hurricanes. The Chinese and European parts are both funded by National Programme on Global Change and Air-Sea Interaction and other relevant programme to run this project.
