Instabilities of coupled density fronts and their nonlinear evolution in the two-layer rotating shallow-water model: influence of the lower layer and of the topography

2013 ◽  
Vol 716 ◽  
pp. 528-565 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bruno Ribstein ◽  
Vladimir Zeitlin
Keyword(s):  
Shallow Water ◽  
Nonlinear Evolution ◽  
Lower Layer ◽  
Phase Locking ◽  
Water Model ◽  
Shallow Water Model ◽  
Wave Instability ◽  
Rotating Shallow Water ◽  
New Generation ◽  
Rotating Shallow Water Equations

AbstractWe undertake a detailed analysis of linear stability of geostrophically balanced double density fronts in the framework of the two-layer rotating shallow-water model on the $f$-plane with topography, the latter being represented by an escarpment beneath the fronts. We use the pseudospectral collocation method to identify and quantify different kinds of instabilities resulting from phase locking and resonances of frontal, Rossby, Poincaré and topographic waves. A swap in the leading long-wave instability from the classical barotropic form, resulting from the resonance of two frontal waves, to a baroclinic form, resulting from the resonance of Rossby and frontal waves, takes place with decreasing depth of the lower layer. Nonlinear development and saturation of these instabilities, and of an instability of topographic origin, resulting from the resonance of frontal and topographic waves, are studied and compared with the help of a new-generation well-balanced finite-volume code for multilayer rotating shallow-water equations. The results of the saturation for different instabilities are shown to produce very different secondary coherent structures. The influence of the topography on these processes is highlighted.

scholarly journals Improved moist-convective rotating shallow water model and its application to instabilities of hurricane-like vortices

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
LMD
Keyword(s):  
Tropical Cyclone ◽  
Shallow Water ◽  
Water Vapour ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Precipitable Water ◽  
Water Model ◽  
Moist Convection ◽  
Shallow Water Model ◽  
Atmospheric Motions ◽  
Rotating Shallow Water

We show how the two-layer moist-convective rotating shallow water model (mcRSW), which proved to be a simple and robust tool for studying effects of moist convection on large-scale atmospheric motions, can be improved by including, in addition to the water vapour, precipitable water, and the effects of vaporisation, entrainment, and precipitation. Thus improved mcRSW becomes cloud-resolving. It is applied, as an illustration, to model the development of instabilities of tropical cyclone-like vortices.

scholarly journals Two Different Aperiodic Phases of Wind-Driven Ocean Circulation in a Double-Gyre, Two-Layer Shallow-Water Model

2006 ◽  
Vol 36 (7) ◽  
pp. 1265-1286 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tomonori Matsuura ◽  
Mitsutaka Fujita
Keyword(s):  
Power Spectrum ◽  
Shallow Water ◽  
Metastable State ◽  
Ocean Circulation ◽  
Lower Layer ◽  
Water Model ◽  
Barotropic Instability ◽  
Shallow Water Model ◽  
Gyre Circulation ◽  
Double Gyre

Abstract A two-layer shallow-water model is used to investigate the transition of wind-driven double-gyre circulation from laminar flow to turbulence as the Reynolds number (Re) is systematically increased. Two distinctly different phases of turbulent double-gyre patterns and energy trajectories are exhibited before and after at Re = 95: deterministic and fully developed turbulent circulations. In the former phase, the inertial subgyres vary between an asymmetric solution and an antisymmetric solution and the double-gyre circulations reach the aperiodic solution mainly due to their barotropic instability. An integrated kinetic energy in the lower layer is slight and the generated mesoscale eddies are confined in the upper layer. The power spectrum of energies integrated over the whole domain at Re = 70 has peaks at the interannual periods (4–7 yr) and the interdecadal period (10–20 yr). The loops of the attractors take on one cycle at those periods and display the blue-sky catastrophe. At Re = 95, the double-gyre circulation reaches a metastable state and the attracters obtained from the three energies form a topological manifold. In the latter, as Re increases, the double-gyre varies from a metastable state to a chaotic state because of the barotropic instability of the eastward jet and the baroclinic instability of recirculation retrograde flow, and the eastward jet meanders significantly with interdecadal variability. The generated eddies cascade to the red side of the power spectrum as expected in the geostrophic turbulence. The main results in the simulation may indicate essential mechanisms for the appearance of multiple states of the Kuroshio and for low-frequency variations in the midlatitude ocean.

Instabilities of buoyancy-driven coastal currents and their nonlinear evolution in the two-layer rotating shallow water model. Part 2. Active lower layer

2010 ◽  
Vol 665 ◽  
pp. 209-237 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. GULA ◽  
V. ZEITLIN ◽  
F. BOUCHUT
Keyword(s):  
Shallow Water ◽  
Linear Stability ◽  
Nonlinear Evolution ◽  
Lower Layer ◽  
Short Wave ◽  
Finite Volume Scheme ◽  
Coastal Currents ◽  
Mean Flow ◽  
The Mean ◽  
Rotating Shallow Water

This paper is the second part of the work on linear and nonlinear stability of buoyancy-driven coastal currents. Part 1, concerning a passive lower layer, was presented in the companion paper Gula & Zeitlin (J. Fluid Mech., vol. 659, 2010, p. 69). In this part, we use a fully baroclinic two-layer model, with active lower layer. We revisit the linear stability problem for coastal currents and study the nonlinear evolution of the instabilities with the help of high-resolution direct numerical simulations. We show how nonlinear saturation of the ageostrophic instabilities leads to reorganization of the mean flow and emergence of coherent vortices. We follow the same lines as in Part 1 and, first, perform a complete linear stability analysis of the baroclinic coastal currents for various depths and density ratios. We then study the nonlinear evolution of the unstable modes with the help of the recent efficient two-layer generalization of the one-layer well-balanced finite-volume scheme for rotating shallow water equations, which allows the treatment of outcropping and loss of hyperbolicity associated with shear, Kelvin–Helmholtz type, instabilities. The previous single-layer results are recovered in the limit of large depth ratios. For depth ratios of order one, new baroclinic long-wave instabilities come into play due to the resonances among Rossby and frontal- or coastal-trapped waves. These instabilities saturate by forming coherent baroclinic vortices, and lead to a complete reorganization of the initial current. As in Part 1, Kelvin fronts play an important role in this process. For even smaller depth ratios, short-wave shear instabilities with large growth rates rapidly develop. We show that at the nonlinear stage they produce short-wave meanders with enhanced dissipation. However, they do not change, globally, the structure of the mean flow which undergoes secondary large-scale instabilities leading to coherent vortex formation and cutoff.

scholarly journals Symmetries and exact solutions of the rotating shallow-water equations

2009 ◽  
Vol 20 (5) ◽  
pp. 461-477 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. A. CHESNOKOV
Keyword(s):  
Exact Solutions ◽  
Shallow Water ◽  
Shallow Water Equations ◽  
Water Model ◽  
New Class ◽  
New Exact Solutions ◽  
Time Periodic Solutions ◽  
Rotating Shallow Water ◽  
Rotating Shallow Water Equations ◽  
Time Periodic

Lie symmetry analysis is applied to study the non-linear rotating shallow-water equations. The 9-dimensional Lie algebra of point symmetries admitted by the model is found. It is shown that the rotating shallow-water equations can be transformed to the classical shallow-water model. The derived symmetries are used to generate new exact solutions of the rotating shallow-water equations. In particular, a new class of time-periodic solutions with quasi-closed particle trajectories is constructed and studied. The symmetry reduction method is also used to obtain some invariant solutions of the model. Examples of these solutions are presented with a brief physical interpretation.

scholarly journals Influence of condensation and latent heat release upon barotropic and baroclinic instabilities of vortices in rotating shallow water f -plane model

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
LMD
Keyword(s):  
Heat Release ◽  
Shallow Water ◽  
Latent Heat ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Lower Layer ◽  
Passive Scalar ◽  
Water Model ◽  
Moist Convection ◽  
Latent Heat Release ◽  
Rotating Shallow Water

Analysis of the influence of condensation and related latent heat release upon developing barotropic and baroclinic instabilities of large-scale low Rossby-number shielded vortices on the f - plane is performed within the moist-convective rotating shallow water model, in its barotropic (one-layer) and baroclinic (two-layer) versions. Numerical simulations with a high-resolution well-balanced finite-volume code, using a relaxation parameterisation for condensation, are made. Evolution of the instability in four different environments, with humidity (i) behaving as passive scalar, (ii) subject to condensation beyond a saturation threshold, (iii) sub-ject to condensation and evaporation, with two different parameterisations of the latter, are inter-ompared.The simulations are initialised with unstable modes determined from the detailed linear stability analysis in the “dry” version of the model. In a configuration corresponding to low-level mid-latitude atmospheric vortices, it is shown that the known scenario of evolution of barotropically unstable vortices, consisting information of a pair of dipoles (“dipolar breakdown”) is substantially modified by condensation and related moist convection, especially in the presence of surface evaporation. No enhancement of the instability due to precipitation was detected in this case. Cyclone-anticyclone asymmetry with respect to sensitivity tothe moist effects is evidenced. It is shown that inertia-gravity wave emission during the vortex evolution is enhanced by the moist effects. In the baroclinic configuration corresponding to idealised cut-off lows in the atmosphere, it is shown that the azimuthal structure of the leading unstable mode is sensitive to the details of stratification. Scenarios of evolution are completely different for different azimuthal structures, one leading to dipolar breaking, and another to tripole formation. The effects of moisture considerably enhance the perturbations in the lower layer, especially in the tripole formation scenario.

Rotating Shallow-Water model with Horizontal Density and/or Temperature Gradients

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vladimir Zeitlin
Keyword(s):  
Shallow Water ◽  
Potential Temperature ◽  
Wave Spectrum ◽  
Water Model ◽  
Strong Mixing ◽  
Shallow Water Model ◽  
New Class ◽  
Centrifugal Instability ◽  
Rotating Shallow Water ◽  
Specific Equation

The derivation of rotating shallow-water equations by vertical averaging and columnar motion hypothesis is repeated without supposing horizontal homogeneity of density/potential temperature. The so-called thermal rotating shallow-water model arises as the result. The model turns to be equivalent to gas dynamics with a specific equation of state. It is shown that it possesses Hamiltonian structure and can be derived from a variational principle. Its solution at low Rossby numbers should obey the thermo-geostrophic equilibrium, replacing the standard geostrophic equilibrium. The wave spectrum of the model is analysed, and the appearance of a whole new class of vortex instabilities of convective type, resembling asymmetric centrifugal instability and leading to a strong mixing at nonlinear stage, is demonstrated.

Simplifying Primitive Equations: Rotating Shallow-Water Models and their Properties

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vladimir Zeitlin
Keyword(s):  
Conservation Laws ◽  
Shallow Water ◽  
Variational Principles ◽  
Mean Field ◽  
Tangent Plane ◽  
Primitive Equations ◽  
Water Model ◽  
Shallow Water Model ◽  
Shallow Water Models ◽  
Rotating Shallow Water

In this chapter, one- and two-layer versions of the rotating shallow-water model on the tangent plane to the rotating, and on the whole rotating sphere, are derived from primitive equations by vertical averaging and columnar motion (mean-field) hypothesis. Main properties of the models including conservation laws and wave-vortex dichotomy are established. Potential vorticity conservation is derived, and the properties of inertia–gravity waves are exhibited. The model is then reformulated in Lagrangian coordinates, variational principles for its one- and two-layer version are established, and conservation laws are reinterpreted in these terms.

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