Data from: Fate of internal waves on a shallow shelf

Internal waves strongly influence the physical and chemical environment of
coastal ecosystems worldwide. We report novel observations from a
distributed temperature sensing (DTS) system that tracked the
transformation of internal waves from the shelf break to the surf zone
over a narrow shelf-slope region in the South China Sea. The
spatially-continuous view of temperature fields provides a perspective of
physical processes commonly available only in laboratory settings or
numerical models, including internal wave reflection off a natural slope,
shoreward transport of dense fluid within trapped cores, and observations
of internal run-down (near-bed, offshore-directed jets of water preceding
a breaking internal wave).  Analysis shows that the fate of
internal waves on this shelf – whether transmitted into shallow waters or
reflected back offshore – is mediated by local water column density
structure and background currents set by the previous shoaling internal
waves, highlighting the importance of wave-wave interactions in nearshore
internal wave dynamics.