Air-sea fluxes including the effect of the molecular skin layer

For realistic environmental conditions, profiles of velocity, temperature and carbon dioxide concentration are presented. They extend from some height in the air through the interface down to some depth in the sea. While the major transfer resistance of momentum lies within the turbulent atmospheric layer, the temperature profile is influenced by the skin layers at both sides. The flux of carbon dioxide is mainly controlled by the skin of the ocean. During calm situations the transfer is influenced by stratification changing to exclusively molecular transports for stable stratification but to free convection for unstable stratification. For passive tracers such as carbon dioxide a corresponding parameterisation of the transfer velocity is presented.