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How is Mean Dynamic Topography calculated ?

April 26, 2017calculated Dynamic mean topography

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How is Mean Dynamic Topography calculated ?

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The MDT used for Aviso products is called Rio05 and is computed starting from a first guess based on • Grace data (altimetric Mean Sea Surface minus Grace geoid, further spatially filtered using a 400km gaussian filter) • and the Levitus climatology referenced to 1500m at low and mid latitudes. By construction, the average of the Rio05MDT values over the global oceans equatorward 40° corresponds to the average over the same region of the Levitus climatology referenced to 1500m. As a result, values of the Rio05 MDT for the global oceans vary from -60cm (Antarctic circumpolar current) to 280 cm, and in most areas the ADT is positive. The MDT is used to calculate the Absolute Dynamic Topography (ADT) according to ADT = MDT + SLA. Further information: The Rio05 Combined Mean Dynamic Topography (CMDT) .