Abstract
Atlantic Water (AW) and Levantine Intermediate Water (LIW) are important water masses that play a crucial role in the internal variability of the Mediterranean thermohaline circulation. To be more specific, their variability and interaction, along with other water masses that characterize the Mediterranean basin, such as the Western Mediterranean Deep Water (WMDW), contribute to modify the Mediterranean Outflow through the Strait of Gibraltar, and hence they may influence the stability of the global thermohaline circulation. This work aims to characterize AW and LIW in the Mediterranean Sea, taking advantage of the large observational dataset (freely available on https://argo.ucsd.edu, https://www.ocean-ops.org, last access: 17 January 2022; Wong et al., 2020) provided by Argo floats from 2001 to 2019. AW and LIW were identified using different diagnostic methods, highlighting the inter-basin variability and the strong zonal gradient that both denote the two water masses in this marginal sea. Their temporal variability was also investigated over the last 2 decades, providing a more robust view of AW and LIW characteristics, which have only been investigated using very short periods in previous studies due to a lack of data. A clear salinification and warming trend characterize AW and LIW over the last 2 decades (∼ 0.007 ± 0.140 and 0.006 ± 0.038 yr−1; 0.026 ± 0.715 and 0.022 ± 0.232 ∘C yr−1, respectively). The salinity and temperature trends found at sub-basin scale are in good agreement with previous results. The strongest trends are found in the Adriatic basin in the properties of both AW and LIW.