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<front>
<journal-meta>
<journal-id journal-id-type="publisher">EGUsphere</journal-id>
<journal-title-group>
<journal-title>EGUsphere</journal-title>
<abbrev-journal-title abbrev-type="publisher">EGUsphere</abbrev-journal-title>
<abbrev-journal-title abbrev-type="nlm-ta">EGUsphere</abbrev-journal-title>
</journal-title-group>
<issn pub-type="epub"></issn>
<publisher><publisher-name>Copernicus Publications</publisher-name>
<publisher-loc>Göttingen, Germany</publisher-loc>
</publisher>
</journal-meta>
<article-meta>
<article-id pub-id-type="doi">10.5194/egusphere-2026-2092</article-id>
<title-group>
<article-title>Thermohaline gradients and frontal regimes in the northwestern Tropical Atlantic</article-title>
</title-group>
<contrib-group><contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Napolitano</surname>
<given-names>Dante C.</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff1">
<sup>1</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Gula</surname>
<given-names>Jonathan</given-names>
<ext-link>https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0876-9557</ext-link>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff1">
<sup>1</sup>
</xref>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff2">
<sup>2</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Coadou-Chaventon</surname>
<given-names>Solange</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff3">
<sup>3</sup>
</xref>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff4">
<sup>4</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Speich</surname>
<given-names>Sabrina</given-names>
<ext-link>https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5452-8287</ext-link>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff3">
<sup>3</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Rocha</surname>
<given-names>Cesar B.</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff5">
<sup>5</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>McWilliams</surname>
<given-names>James C.</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff6">
<sup>6</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Zhang</surname>
<given-names>Dongxiao</given-names>
<ext-link>https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5788-911X</ext-link>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff7">
<sup>7</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Carton</surname>
<given-names>Xavier</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff1">
<sup>1</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
</contrib-group><aff id="aff1">
<label>1</label>
<addr-line>Univ. Brest, CNRS, Ifremer, IRD, Laboratoire d’Océanographie Physique et Spatiale (LOPS), IUEM, F29280, Plouzané, France</addr-line>
</aff>
<aff id="aff2">
<label>2</label>
<addr-line>Institut Universitaire de France (IUF), Paris, France</addr-line>
</aff>
<aff id="aff3">
<label>3</label>
<addr-line>LMD/IPSL, ENS, PSL University, École Polytechnique, Institut Polytechnique de Paris, Sorbonne Université, CNRS, Paris, France</addr-line>
</aff>
<aff id="aff4">
<label>4</label>
<addr-line>Department of Marine Sciences, University of Gothenburg, Gothenburg, Sweden</addr-line>
</aff>
<aff id="aff5">
<label>5</label>
<addr-line>Instituto Oceanográfico, Universidade de São Paulo, São Paulo, Brazil</addr-line>
</aff>
<aff id="aff6">
<label>6</label>
<addr-line>Department of Atmospheric and Ocean Sciences, University of California Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California, USA</addr-line>
</aff>
<aff id="aff7">
<label>7</label>
<addr-line>CICOES/University of Washington and NOAA Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory, Seattle, USA</addr-line>
</aff>
<pub-date pub-type="epub">
<day>22</day>
<month>04</month>
<year>2026</year>
</pub-date>
<volume>2026</volume>
<fpage>1</fpage>
<lpage>36</lpage>
<permissions>
<copyright-statement>Copyright: &#x000a9; 2026 Dante C. Napolitano et al.</copyright-statement>
<copyright-year>2026</copyright-year>
<license license-type="open-access">
<license-p>This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. To view a copy of this licence, visit <ext-link ext-link-type="uri"  xlink:href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/</ext-link></license-p>
</license>
</permissions>
<self-uri xlink:href="https://egusphere.copernicus.org/preprints/2026/egusphere-2026-2092/">This article is available from https://egusphere.copernicus.org/preprints/2026/egusphere-2026-2092/</self-uri>
<self-uri xlink:href="https://egusphere.copernicus.org/preprints/2026/egusphere-2026-2092/egusphere-2026-2092.pdf">The full text article is available as a PDF file from https://egusphere.copernicus.org/preprints/2026/egusphere-2026-2092/egusphere-2026-2092.pdf</self-uri>
<abstract>
<p>At the edge of the Amazon River plume, stirring by the North Brazil Current (NBC) and its eddies creates sharp surface thermohaline gradients on scales of &lt;em&gt;O&lt;/em&gt;(1&amp;ndash;100) km. This study provides a comprehensive picture of these gradients and fronts associated with the region&apos;s distinctive dynamics. Saildrone observations show that the plume amplifies density gradient variability at all scales from 1&amp;ndash;100 km, with frontal sharpness up to 75x stronger inside the plume than outside, with differences reaching 100x at scales below 3 km. Partial temperature-salinity compensation and reinforcement act on density gradients, with net frontogenesis observed in both regions. To expand &lt;em&gt;in-situ&lt;/em&gt; observations, we use a 1-km resolution CROCO simulation to assess the spatial distribution of surface fronts and their spatio-temporal variability. We characterize three distinct frontal regimes: broken-up fronts parallel to shore occupy the plume core over the continental shelf, thin elongated fronts associated with NBC-plume interactions connect nearshore and offshore regions, and pools of anisotropic fronts driven by the mixed-layer cycle are present offshore. Salinity dominates density gradients throughout the year north of 15 &amp;deg;N, whereas near-shore fronts exhibit seasonal shifts in temperature-salinity dominance linked to the Amazon discharge seasonality and NBC strength. Within the plume, freshwater filaments stirred by NBC rings systematically generate compensated fronts on their inner edge and reinforced fronts on their outer rim, a pattern with implications for energy cascades and tracer export.</p>
</abstract>
<counts><page-count count="36"/></counts>
<funding-group>
<award-group id="gs1">
<funding-source>Agence Nationale de la Recherche</funding-source>
<award-id>ANR-19-JPOC-0004-05</award-id>
<award-id>ANR-19-CE01-0002-01</award-id>
</award-group>
<award-group id="gs2">
<funding-source>Région Bretagne</funding-source>
<award-id>ANR-19-JPOC-0004-05</award-id>
</award-group>
<award-group id="gs3">
<funding-source>Office of Naval Research</funding-source>
<award-id>N00014-23-1-2226</award-id>
</award-group>
<award-group id="gs4">
<funding-source>Centre National d’Etudes Spatiales</funding-source>
<award-id>CNES 19-1 2021</award-id>
</award-group>
<award-group id="gs5">
<funding-source>Horizon 2020</funding-source>
<award-id>81757</award-id>
</award-group>
<award-group id="gs6">
<funding-source>Grand Équipement National De Calcul Intensif</funding-source>
<award-id>2023-A0090112051</award-id>
</award-group>
<award-group id="gs7">
<funding-source>National Aeronautics and Space Administration</funding-source>
<award-id>NH17ZDA001N-EVS3)</award-id>
</award-group>
<award-group id="gs8">
<funding-source>Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo</funding-source>
<award-id>2023/10506-0</award-id>
</award-group>
</funding-group>
</article-meta>
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