SCOTT DONEY (UVA) WILL LEAD WITHIN THE OVERALL PROJECT THE OCEAN BIOGEOCHEMICAL MODELING EFFORT WHICH WILL PLAY MULTIPLE ROLES IN THIS INVESTIGATION: INFORMING FIELD STUDIES ASSISTING IN FIELD/SATELLITE DATA INTERPRETATION AND CASTING RESULTS IN THE CONTEXT OF LONGTERM CLIMATE CHANGE. SPECIFICALLY HE AND HIS GROUP WILL BE RESPONSIBLE FOR THE DEVELOPMENT IMPLEMENTATION AND ANALYSIS OF OCEAN SIMULATIONS USING THE OCEAN COMPONENT OF THE COMMUNITY EARTH SYSTEM MODEL (CESM). HIS GROUP WILL ALSO BE INVOLVED IN THE ANALYSIS OF OPERATIONAL ATMOSPHERE AND OCEAN FORECAST MODELS. THE MODELING COMPONENT WILL SUPPORT THE SHIP-BASED AND AIRBORNE FIELD CAMPAIGNS THROUGH THREE INTERCONNECTED ACTIVITIES OR MODES: OBSERVATIONAL DESIGN MODE FOR EXPERIMENTAL AND SAMPLING DESIGN PRIOR TO GOING INTO THE FIELD; FORECAST MODE FOR PROVIDING SHORT-TERM PREDICTIONS (WEEKS/MONTH) OF EDDIES SEASONAL CYCLE ETC. JUST PRIOR TO AND DURING THE FIELD EXPERIMENTS; AND HINDCAST MODE FOR ANALYZING THE FIELD DATA AFTER THE CAMPAIGNS. PRIOR TO FIELD CAMPAIGNS THE UVA GROUP WILL DETERMINE OPTIMAL LOCATIONS AND SAMPLING STRATEGIES BASED ON OBSERVATIONAL DESIGN EXPERIMENTS THAT CHARACTERIZE THE TYPICAL SEASONAL EVOLUTION FOR THE SUBARCTIC ATLANTIC OVER DIFFERENT PHASES OF THE NORTH ATLANTIC OSCILLATION A DOMINANT REGIONAL CLIMATE DRIVER. THE GROUP WILL CONDUCT AND ANALYZE HISTORICAL OCEAN EXPERIMENTS FORCED BY A COMBINATION OF WEATHER FORECAST CENTER MODELS AND OBSERVATIONAL ESTIMATES OF THE BEST STATE OF THE ATMOSPHERE. THE GROUP WILL ALSO ANALYZE SATELLITE OCEAN COLOR REMOTE SENSING AND EDDY-RESOLVING OCEAN SIMULATIONS (1/10 DEGREE HORIZONTAL RESOLUTION) FOR THE NORTH ATLANTIC BASIN TO DOCUMENT STATISTICALLY THE DYNAMICS TIME AND SPACE-SCALES AND THE CROSS-CORRELATIONS AMONG PHYSICAL AND BIOLOGICAL VARIABLES DUE TO OCEANIC MESOSCALE EDDIES. DURING THE FIELD CAMPAIGNS THE UVA GROUP WILL CONDUCT OCEAN FORECAST EXPERIMENTS FOR OPERATIONAL PLANNING PURPOSES AS WELL AS FOR ANALYSIS OF EVENTS IN NEAR REAL TIME. THE OCEAN PROGNOSTIC MODEL RESULTS WILL BE SUPPLEMENTED WITH STATE ANALYSIS AND FORECAST PRODUCTS FROM OPERATIONAL OCEAN DATA ASSIMILATION/FORECAST CENTERS (E.G. MERCATOR). FOLLOWING THE FIELD CAMPAIGNS THE GROUP WILL CARRY OUT OCEAN HINDCAST EXPERIMENTS FOR THE FIELD TIME-PERIODS USING ATMOSPHERIC ANALYSIS RESULTS SPECIFIC TO THE TIME-PERIOD OF OUR FIELD AND SATELLITE OBSERVATIONS. THE HINDCAST SIMULATIONS WILL FACILITATE THE ANALYSIS AND INTERPRETATIONS OF THE SURFACE AIRBORNE AND SATELLITE DATA PROVIDING ADDITIONAL AND COMPLEMENTARY INFORMATION ON MECHANISMS AND A LARGE-SCALE CONTEXT FOR EXTRAPOLATING THE FIELD DATA TO BASIN SCALE. MODEL-DATA INTERCOMPARISONS WILL IN TURN CONTRIBUTE INSIGHTS ON SYSTEM FUNCTIONING FOR MODEL DEVELOPMENT AND IMPROVEMENT.