About Jinlun Zhang

Dr. Zhang is interested in quantifying and understanding climate change in the Polar Regions. He investigates the properties of polar ice-ocean systems by developing large-scale sea ice and ocean models such as the Pan-arctic Ice-Ocean Modeling and Assimilation System (PIOMAS), the Global Ice-Ocean Modeling and Assimilation System (GIOMAS), and the Marginal Ice Zone Modeling and Assimilation System (MIZMAS). He also studies the impact of changes in sea ice on marine planktonic ecosystems by developing biophysical models such as the coupled Biology-Ice-Ocean Modeling and Assimilation System (BIOMAS). He has developed efficient sea ice dynamics models that are particularly useful for stable, high-resolution modeling. He is interested in developing next-generation sea ice models which capture anisotropic nature of ice dynamics/mechanics and explicitly simulate both ice thickness distribution and floe size distribution jointly. His research results have been published in the Journal of Physical Oceanography, the Journal of Geophysical Research, the Journal of Climate, Monthly Weather Review, Geophysical Research Letters, Ocean Modeling, Deep Sea Research, and other scientific journals. Dr. Zhang joined the Laboratory in 1994.

In The News

Selected Projects

  • MIZMAS

    The overarching goal of the MIZMAS project is to enhance our understanding of MIZ processes and interactions, and to strengthen our prediction capability of future climate change, particularly the changes in both the ITD and the FSD, in the CBS. We propose numerical investigations of the historical and contemporary changes in the sea ice and upper ocean of the CBSMIZ. We also plan to investigate future changes of the CBSMIZ under global warming scenarios. These investigations involve new and potentially transformative theoretical and numerical work to develop, implement, and validate a new coupled ice–ocean Marginal Ice Zone Modeling and Assimilation System (MIZMAS) that will enhance the representation of the unique MIZ processes by incorporating a FSD and corresponding model improvements.

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  • Arctic Sea Ice Volume Anomaly

    The Arctic Sea Ice Volume Anomaly time series is calculated using the Pan-Arctic Ice Ocean Modeling and Assimilation System (PIOMAS) developed at APL/PSC.  Updates will be generated at approximately monthly intervals.

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  • Projections of an Ice-Diminished Arctic Ocean – Retrospection and Future Projection

    Significant changes in arctic climate have been detected in recent years. One of the most striking changes is the decline of sea ice concurrent with changes in atmospheric circulation and increased surface air temperature.

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Selected Publications

ABOUT PSC