| ABSTRACT | The Mediterranean Sea has a complex, largely surface forced circulation driven by the combined effects of air-sea heat and freshwater flux induced buoyancy loss and wind stress variations. Significant uncertainty remains in the characteristics of these air-sea-flux fields both as regards their mean state and variability. In this talk, both of these aspects will be reviewed with reference to leading observation-based datasets (e.g. OAFlux, ERA-Interim) and high-resolution ocean models (e.g. 1/12 deg NEMO). A particular focus will be placed on the spatial and temporal dependence of air-sea flux variability from space scales of 10 km up to sub-basin, and timescales of days to decades. It will be shown that the characteristic patterns of air-sea forcing change significantly as a function of sampling time interval and the processes responsible for these changes will be discussed. The changes will be placed in the context of severe winter forcing episodes such as those occurring in the Aegean Sea in the early 1990s, the Gulf of Lions in 2004-05 and over a wider Mediterranean domain in 2011/12. Finally, the long-standing and still unresolved problem of closure of the Mediterranean heat and freshwater budgets will be reconsidered from the perspective of the recent higher resolution observation and model products. |