Abstract's details
Mapping the Known and Invisible in the age of SWOT: Fine-Scale Ocean Currents from the VERSO/FaSt-SWOT collaboration
Event: 2025 SWOT Science Team Meeting
Session: Oceanography: Regional Validation
Presentation type: Oral
The VERSO SWOT science team project builds on previous work to advance the understanding of oceanic mesoscale and submesoscale features—fronts, eddies, filaments, and meanders—through an integrated approach combining satellite data, in-situ observations, and high-resolution modeling. Focusing on spatial scales from 10 to 100 km, traditionally unresolved by conventional altimetry, it leverages the novel capabilities of the SWOT satellite to study fine-scale ocean dynamics in the Western Mediterranean Sea, a natural laboratory for globally relevant processes.
The investigation follows two main lines: first, it analyzes data from the FaSt-SWOT field campaigns, conducted during SWOT’s fast-sampling phase in Spring 2023. These campaigns, supported by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation, featured a multi-platform experiment targeting a small anticyclonic eddy north of Ibiza, integrating ship-based CTD and ADCP measurements, gliders, drifters, and satellite-guided sampling strategies. Second, it develops advanced 3D reconstruction techniques using deep learning and data assimilation, applied to both 1-day and 21-day SWOT orbit datasets. Preliminary results from the FaSt-SWOT campaigns are particularly compelling: SWOT accurately detected the surface signature of a ~25 km-radius anticyclonic eddy, confirmed by multi-platform in-situ observations as intrathermocline. Maximum velocities of 30 cm/s were recorded at 175 m depth by ADCP, and biconvex isopycnals observed by gliders confirmed the eddy’s structure. Comparisons demonstrated SWOT’s exceptional performance, reducing sea level representation errors by 33% (vs. gliders), horizontal velocity errors by 41% (vs. ADCP), and velocity magnitude and direction errors by 44% and 10%, respectively, (vs. surface drifters). These findings unequivocally highlight SWOT transformative capacity to resolve mesoscale and submesoscale dynamics.
Beyond in-situ and satellite data, complementary numerical simulations support the interpretation of observations and help quantify ageostrophic motions, with a particular focus on the estimation of vertical velocities from SWOT-derived surface fields, combined with glider and model data. Additional analyses include high-frequency radar data to assess dominant spatial and temporal variability in coastal regions and support SWOT resolution assessment. Tools for Lagrangian diagnostics, eddy tracking, and neural-network-based 3D reconstructions of ocean states will be expanded, contributing novel methodologies for SWOT-era of oceanography. Active involvement in the SWOT Adaptive Campaigns Consortium (formerly Adopt-A-Crossover) and the regional validation working group further underscores our commitment to international coordination and scientific progress.
VERSO/FaSt-SWOT collaboration
• B. Barceló-Llull – IMEDEA (CSIC-UIB), Spain
• A. Bonilla – IMEDEA (CSIC-UIB), Spain
• B. Casas – SOCIB, Spain
• V. Combes – IMEDEA (CSIC-UIB), Spain
• E. Cutolo – IMT Atlantique, France
• L. Díaz – SOCIB, Spain
• A. Doglioli – Aix-Marseille Université, France
• F. D'Ovidio – LOCEAN-IPSL, France
• R. Fablet – IMT Atlantique, France
• T. Farrar – WHOI, USA
• L. Gómez-Navarro – IMEDEA (CSIC-UIB), Spain
• J. Fernández – SOCIB, Spain
• J. Le Sommer – IGE, France
• I. Lizarán – SOCIB, Spain
• G. López – SOCIB, Spain
• R. Morrow – LEGOS, France
• B. Mourre – IMEDEA(CSIC-UIB), Spain
• A. Pascual – IMEDEA (CSIC-UIB), Spain
• E. Reyes – SOCIB, Spain
• Ll. Ribot – SOCIB, Spain
• R. Rodríguez – SOCIB, Spain
• D.R. Tarry – APL, UW, USA
• J. Tintoré – IMEDEA (CSIC-UIB) & SOCIB, Spain
• D. Vega-Giménez – IMEDEA (CSIC-UIB), Spain
• E. Verger-Miralles – IMEDEA (CSIC-UIB), Spain
• J. Wang – JPL / TAMU, USA
• N. Zarokanellos – SOCIB, Spain
Cruise plan and cruise report:
https://doi.org/10.20350/digitalCSIC/15276
https://doi.org/10.20350/digitalCSIC/16077
Raw Dataset:
https://doi.org/10.20350/digitalCSIC/16511
Outreach material:
http://hdl.handle.net/10261/351719
http://hdl.handle.net/10261/350728
https://doi.org/10.20350/digitalCSIC/16660
https://doi.org/10.20350/digitalCSIC/16661
Back to the list of abstractThe investigation follows two main lines: first, it analyzes data from the FaSt-SWOT field campaigns, conducted during SWOT’s fast-sampling phase in Spring 2023. These campaigns, supported by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation, featured a multi-platform experiment targeting a small anticyclonic eddy north of Ibiza, integrating ship-based CTD and ADCP measurements, gliders, drifters, and satellite-guided sampling strategies. Second, it develops advanced 3D reconstruction techniques using deep learning and data assimilation, applied to both 1-day and 21-day SWOT orbit datasets. Preliminary results from the FaSt-SWOT campaigns are particularly compelling: SWOT accurately detected the surface signature of a ~25 km-radius anticyclonic eddy, confirmed by multi-platform in-situ observations as intrathermocline. Maximum velocities of 30 cm/s were recorded at 175 m depth by ADCP, and biconvex isopycnals observed by gliders confirmed the eddy’s structure. Comparisons demonstrated SWOT’s exceptional performance, reducing sea level representation errors by 33% (vs. gliders), horizontal velocity errors by 41% (vs. ADCP), and velocity magnitude and direction errors by 44% and 10%, respectively, (vs. surface drifters). These findings unequivocally highlight SWOT transformative capacity to resolve mesoscale and submesoscale dynamics.
Beyond in-situ and satellite data, complementary numerical simulations support the interpretation of observations and help quantify ageostrophic motions, with a particular focus on the estimation of vertical velocities from SWOT-derived surface fields, combined with glider and model data. Additional analyses include high-frequency radar data to assess dominant spatial and temporal variability in coastal regions and support SWOT resolution assessment. Tools for Lagrangian diagnostics, eddy tracking, and neural-network-based 3D reconstructions of ocean states will be expanded, contributing novel methodologies for SWOT-era of oceanography. Active involvement in the SWOT Adaptive Campaigns Consortium (formerly Adopt-A-Crossover) and the regional validation working group further underscores our commitment to international coordination and scientific progress.
VERSO/FaSt-SWOT collaboration
• B. Barceló-Llull – IMEDEA (CSIC-UIB), Spain
• A. Bonilla – IMEDEA (CSIC-UIB), Spain
• B. Casas – SOCIB, Spain
• V. Combes – IMEDEA (CSIC-UIB), Spain
• E. Cutolo – IMT Atlantique, France
• L. Díaz – SOCIB, Spain
• A. Doglioli – Aix-Marseille Université, France
• F. D'Ovidio – LOCEAN-IPSL, France
• R. Fablet – IMT Atlantique, France
• T. Farrar – WHOI, USA
• L. Gómez-Navarro – IMEDEA (CSIC-UIB), Spain
• J. Fernández – SOCIB, Spain
• J. Le Sommer – IGE, France
• I. Lizarán – SOCIB, Spain
• G. López – SOCIB, Spain
• R. Morrow – LEGOS, France
• B. Mourre – IMEDEA(CSIC-UIB), Spain
• A. Pascual – IMEDEA (CSIC-UIB), Spain
• E. Reyes – SOCIB, Spain
• Ll. Ribot – SOCIB, Spain
• R. Rodríguez – SOCIB, Spain
• D.R. Tarry – APL, UW, USA
• J. Tintoré – IMEDEA (CSIC-UIB) & SOCIB, Spain
• D. Vega-Giménez – IMEDEA (CSIC-UIB), Spain
• E. Verger-Miralles – IMEDEA (CSIC-UIB), Spain
• J. Wang – JPL / TAMU, USA
• N. Zarokanellos – SOCIB, Spain
Cruise plan and cruise report:
https://doi.org/10.20350/digitalCSIC/15276
https://doi.org/10.20350/digitalCSIC/16077
Raw Dataset:
https://doi.org/10.20350/digitalCSIC/16511
Outreach material:
http://hdl.handle.net/10261/351719
http://hdl.handle.net/10261/350728
https://doi.org/10.20350/digitalCSIC/16660
https://doi.org/10.20350/digitalCSIC/16661