The Local Dynamics of Eddies in the Western North Atlantic

The local dynamics of oceanic mesoscale eddies is a subject of enormous scope and detail. The scope of this paper, on the other hand, is restricted to a particular experiment, the POLYMODE Local Dynamics Experiment (LDE). The LDE is unique among mesoscale experiments to date in its high sampling density and variety of measurements, and thus is well suited to considerations of eddy dynamics in one locale. This uniqueness is, of course, one of degree not kind. Other mesoscale mapping experiments are POLYGON (USSR), MODE, Tourbillon (France), and the USSR component of POLYMODE. We, the authors, are the experimentalists and analysts of the LDE.