Abstract The vertical mixing mechanism (VMM) is one of the most active air‐sea coupling process forced by the ocean. With a 2‐year global coupled 5‐km ICON simulation, we examine the strength, robustness, and scales of the coupling via VMM as approximated by the relation between downwind sea surface temperature (SST) gradients and windstress divergence. While the coupling via VMM is active on the ocean mesoscales around O (100 km), large coherent SST fronts can support such coupling to span over scales larger than 500 km. We find that VMM operates on a wider range of temporal scales than previously thought. In particular, VMM is active not only on monthly but also on daily timescales, and is even present on hourly timescales. The link of VMM to SST variability indicates that the underlying SST is what makes the VMM a multi‐scale phenomenon.
Putrasahan et al. (Wed,) studied this question.