Assimilation of satellite color observations in a coupled ocean GCM-ecosystem model
Monthly average coastal zone color scanner (CZCS) estimates of chlorophyll concentration were assimilated into an ocean global circulation model(GCM) containing a simple model of the pelagic ecosystem. The assimilation was performed in the simplest possible manner, to allow the assessment of whether there were major problems with the ecosystem model or with the assimilation procedure. The current ecosystem model performed well in some regions, but failed in others to assimilate chlorophyll estimates without disrupting important ecosystem properties. This experiment gave insight into those properties of the ecosystem model that must be changed to allow data assimilation to be generally successful, while raising other important issues about the assimilation procedure.