The Brazil Current is a warm water current that flows south along the

Brazil Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...

ian south coast to the mouth of the

Río de la Plata The Río de la Plata (, "river of silver"), also called the River Plate or La Plata River in English, is the estuary formed by the confluence of the Uruguay River and the Paraná River at Punta Gorda. It empties into the Atlantic Ocean and fo ...

Description

This current is caused by diversion of a portion of the

Atlantic The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's five oceans, with an area of about . It covers approximately 20% of Earth's surface and about 29% of its water surface area. It is known to separate the " Old World" of Africa, Europe ...

South Equatorial Current from where that current meets the

South America South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere at the northern tip of the continent. It can also be described as the sou ...

n continent. The Brazil Current begins at about 10–15˚S where the South Equatorial Current (SEC) splits near Cabo de São Roque, Brazil. The current reaches a depth of 700 m and the estimated transport at 12˚S is 2.5 Sv. The transport increases as the current goes further south with 4 Sv at 15˚S. On the offshore side of the current an anticyclonic recirculation gyre at about 30˚S causes an increase of the Brazil Current’s transport. The estimated southward transport at 27˚S, 31˚S, 34˚S, and 36˚S are 11 Sv, 17 Sv, 22 Sv, and 41 Sv. The total transport can be from 70 to 80 Sv by 36˚S with half of it being in the recirculation gyre.Zemba, J.C., 1991. "The structure and transport of the Brazil Current between 27˚ and 36˚ South". Ph.D. thesis, Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, 160 pp. The Brazil Current is a part of the South Atlantic subtropical gyre. The southern side of the gyre consists of the eastward-flowing South Atlantic Current (SAC). The eastern boundary is the Benguela Current System (BCS). The north side consists of the SEC, which flows west and then splits with the north water becoming the North Brazil Current (NBC). The southern-flowing waters become the Brazil Current, which makes up the western boundary. It is a

western boundary current Boundary currents are ocean currents with dynamics determined by the presence of a coastline, and fall into two distinct categories: western boundary currents and eastern boundary currents. Eastern boundary currents Eastern boundary currents are ...

like the

Gulf Stream The Gulf Stream, together with its northern extension the North Atlantic Drift, is a warm and swift Atlantic ocean current that originates in the Gulf of Mexico and flows through the Straits of Florida and up the eastern coastline of the Unit ...

, and is its southern counterpart; however, it is considerably shallower and weaker. It flows south from the equator to the west wind drift. It joins the

Falkland Current The Falkland Current (also called Malvinas Current or Falklands Current) is a cold water current that flows northward along the Atlantic coast of Patagonia as far north as the mouth of the Río de la Plata. This current results from the movement o ...

(Malvinas Current) at the

Argentine Sea The Argentine Sea ( es, Mar Argentino) is a marginal sea of the Atlantic Ocean adjacent to the southern tip of South America. It ranges from the mouth of the estuary of the Río de la Plata in the north (35th parallel south) to the Isla de los ...

(see Brazil–Falkland Confluence), making it a temperate sea.Ecorregión Mar Argentino
The Brazil-Falkland Confluence is where the Brazil Current begins to separate from the coast at about 36˚S and is where the saltier subtropical water of the Brazil Current meets the fresher subantarctic water of the Falkland Current. The main transport of the current leaves the continental shelf at about 38˚S and the sea surface temperature at that latitude is estimated to be about 16–18˚C, although the latitude where the current separates from the coast has been thought to be farther north from July to September than from January to March. If the Falkland Current has low transport then the path of the Brazil Current is dominated by wind stress curl. However, if the Falkland Current transport is increased then the Brazil Current separates from the coast at the observed 38˚S latitude. The range of sea surface temperature and the salinity for the Brazil-Falkland Confluence is 7–18˚C and 33.6–36 psu. The Brazil Current region also contains six major water masses within the system: Upper Circumpolar Water (UCPW), Lower Circumpolar Water (LCPW), Central Water (CW), Antarctic Intermediate Water (AAIW), Antarctic Bottom Water (AABW), and North Atlantic Deep Water (NADW).

References

External links

{{Ocean Currents of the Atlantic Ocean