Phytoplankton patchiness: inferences from particle statistics

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Abstract
The influence of mesoscale turbulence and random growth rate fields upon phytoplankton patchiness was examined on length scales from 1-100 km and time scales from 1-100 days. Phytoplankton concentrations with general nonlinear growth rate functions were considered, such that the concentration was bounded for all time. Particle separation statistics were used to deduce variance spectra of nonlinearly transformed concentration. Two growth rate models were examined: an advected field, and a locally specified field. Both lead to initial patchiness in the concentration, correlated with the growth rate field. The advected growth rate field leads to a temporal peak in the patchiness before the mesoscale turbulence causes the concentration variance to cascade to a noisy spatial distribution that retains no correlation with either the motion field, or the growth rate field. Numerical experiments were outlined to test these results; the occurrence of the peak in patchiness and the time scales associated with its formation and decay.

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