Abstract
Data assimilation has been recently considered as a key and essential component of understanding of oceanic phenomena, development of parameterization process in numerical ocean modeling, mapping out of observation strategies and forecasting of ocean state. Variational adjoint method is introduced as one of the data assimilation method in this introductory review. The basic concept of the variational adjoint method is to combine observations via variational method (estimation theory or Lagrange's multiplier method) with a dynamical model. The method is applied to a parameter estimation in a simple model of an unsteady Ekman flow in physical oceanography. Recent developments of the method are also introduced briefly.
