scholarly journals Jets and Orography: Idealized Experiments with Tip Jets and Lighthill Blocking

2007 ◽  
Vol 64 (10) ◽  
pp. 3627-3639 ◽  
Author(s):  
P. B. Rhines
Keyword(s):  
Numerical Simulations ◽  
Shallow Water ◽  
Rossby Wave ◽  
Potential Vorticity ◽  
Rossby Waves ◽  
Zonal Flow ◽  
Flow Acceleration ◽  
Westerly Flow ◽  
The Mean ◽  
Strong Control

Abstract This paper describes qualitative features of the generation of jetlike concentrated circulations, wakes, and blocks by simple mountainlike orography, both from idealized laboratory experiments and shallow-water numerical simulations on a sphere. The experiments are unstratified with barotropic lee Rossby waves, and jets induced by mountain orography. A persistent pattern of lee jet formation and lee cyclogenesis owes its origins to arrested topographic Rossby waves above the mountain and potential vorticity (PV) advection through them. The wake jet occurs on the equatorward, eastern flank of the topography. A strong upstream blocking of the westerly flow occurs in a Lighthill mode of long Rossby wave propagation, which depends on βa2/U, the ratio of Rossby wave speed based on the scale of the mountain, to zonal advection speed, U (β is the meridional potential vorticity gradient, f is the Coriolis frequency, and a is the diameter of the mountain). Mountains wider (north–south) than the east–west length scale of stationary Rossby waves will tend to block the oncoming westerly flow. These blocks are essentially β plumes, which are illustrated by their linear Green function. For large βa2/U, upwind blocking is strong; the mountain wake can be unstable, filling the fluid with transient Rossby waves as in the numerical simulations of Polvani et al. For small values, βa2/U ≪ 1 classic lee Rossby waves with large wavelength compared to the mountain diameter are the dominant process. The mountain height, δh, relative to the mean fluid depth, H, affects these transitions as well. Simple lee Rossby waves occur only for such small heights, δh/h ≪ aβ/f, that the f/h contours are not greatly distorted by the mountain. Nongeostrophic dynamics are seen in inertial waves generated by geostrophic shear, and ducted by it, and also in a texture of finescale, inadvertent convection. Weakly damped circulations induced in a shallow-water numerical model on a sphere by a lone mountain in an initially simple westerly wind are also described. Here, with βa2/U ∼1, potential vorticity stirring and transient Rossby waves dominate, and drive zonal flow acceleration. Low-latitude critical layers, when present, exert strong control on the high-latitude waves, and with no restorative damping of the mean zonal flow, they migrate poleward toward the source of waves. While these experiments with homogeneous fluid are very simplified, the baroclinic atmosphere and ocean have many tall or equivalent barotropic eddy structures owing to the barotropization process of geostrophic turbulence.

A Balanced Approximation of the One-Layer Shallow-Water Equations on a Sphere

2009 ◽  
Vol 66 (6) ◽  
pp. 1735-1748 ◽  
Author(s):  
W. T. M. Verkley
Keyword(s):  
Shallow Water ◽  
Potential Vorticity ◽  
Shallow Water Equations ◽  
Rossby Waves ◽  
Coriolis Parameter ◽  
Beta Plane ◽  
Propagating Waves ◽  
Barotropic Vorticity Equation ◽  
Barotropic Vorticity ◽  
The One

Abstract A global version of the equivalent barotropic vorticity equation is derived for the one-layer shallow-water equations on a sphere. The equation has the same form as the corresponding beta plane version, but with one important difference: the stretching (Cressman) term in the expression of the potential vorticity retains its full dependence on f 2, where f is the Coriolis parameter. As a check of the resulting system, the dynamics of linear Rossby waves are considered. It is shown that these waves are rather accurate approximations of the westward-propagating waves of the second class of the original shallow-water equations. It is also concluded that for Rossby waves with short meridional wavelengths the factor f 2 in the stretching term can be replaced by the constant value f02, where f0 is the Coriolis parameter at ±45° latitude.

scholarly journals Propagation properties of Rossby waves for latitudinal β-plane variations of <I>f</I> and zonal variations of the shallow water speed

2012 ◽  
Vol 30 (5) ◽  
pp. 849-855 ◽  
Author(s):  
C. T. Duba ◽  
J. F. McKenzie
Keyword(s):  
Shallow Water ◽  
Group Velocity ◽  
Rossby Wave ◽  
Rossby Waves ◽  
Low Frequency ◽  
Wave Number ◽  
Coriolis Parameter ◽  
Propagation Properties ◽  
Wave Normal ◽  
Water Speed

Abstract. Using the shallow water equations for a rotating layer of fluid, the wave and dispersion equations for Rossby waves are developed for the cases of both the standard β-plane approximation for the latitudinal variation of the Coriolis parameter f and a zonal variation of the shallow water speed. It is well known that the wave normal diagram for the standard (mid-latitude) Rossby wave on a β-plane is a circle in wave number (ky,kx) space, whose centre is displaced −β/2 ω units along the negative kx axis, and whose radius is less than this displacement, which means that phase propagation is entirely westward. This form of anisotropy (arising from the latitudinal y variation of f), combined with the highly dispersive nature of the wave, gives rise to a group velocity diagram which permits eastward as well as westward propagation. It is shown that the group velocity diagram is an ellipse, whose centre is displaced westward, and whose major and minor axes give the maximum westward, eastward and northward (southward) group speeds as functions of the frequency and a parameter m which measures the ratio of the low frequency-long wavelength Rossby wave speed to the shallow water speed. We believe these properties of group velocity diagram have not been elucidated in this way before. We present a similar derivation of the wave normal diagram and its associated group velocity curve for the case of a zonal (x) variation of the shallow water speed, which may arise when the depth of an ocean varies zonally from a continental shelf.

Wave-induced mean flows in rotating shallow water with uniform potential vorticity

2018 ◽  
Vol 839 ◽  
pp. 408-429 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jim Thomas ◽  
Oliver Bühler ◽  
K. Shafer Smith
Keyword(s):  
Shallow Water ◽  
Potential Vorticity ◽  
Rotation Rate ◽  
Standing Waves ◽  
Leading Order ◽  
Mean Flow ◽  
Wave Fields ◽  
The Mean ◽  
Rotating Shallow Water ◽  
Wave Induced

Theoretical and numerical computations of the wave-induced mean flow in rotating shallow water with uniform potential vorticity are presented, with an eye towards applications in small-scale oceanography where potential-vorticity anomalies are often weak compared to the waves. The asymptotic computations are based on small-amplitude expansions and time averaging over the fast wave scale to define the mean flow. Importantly, we do not assume that the mean flow is balanced, i.e. we compute the full mean-flow response at leading order. Particular attention is paid to the concept of modified diagnostic relations, which link the leading-order Lagrangian-mean velocity field to certain wave properties known from the linear solution. Both steady and unsteady wave fields are considered, with specific examples that include propagating wavepackets and monochromatic standing waves. Very good agreement between the theoretical predictions and direct numerical simulations of the nonlinear system is demonstrated. In particular, we extend previous studies by considering the impact of unsteady wave fields on the mean flow, and by considering the total kinetic energy of the mean flow as a function of the rotation rate. Notably, monochromatic standing waves provide an explicit counterexample to the often observed tendency of the mean flow to decrease monotonically with the background rotation rate.

Laboratory and numerical studies of baroclinic waves in an internally heated rotating fluid annulus: a case of wave/vortex duality?

1997 ◽  
Vol 337 ◽  
pp. 155-191 ◽  
Author(s):  
P. L. READ ◽  
S. R. LEWIS ◽  
R. HIDE
Keyword(s):  
Numerical Simulations ◽  
Potential Vorticity ◽  
Axisymmetric Flow ◽  
Zonal Flow ◽  
Chaotic Advection ◽  
Rotating Fluid ◽  
Mean Flow ◽  
Baroclinic Waves ◽  
Vortex Merging ◽  
Flow Components

The structure, transport properties and regimes of flow exhibited in a rotating fluid annulus, subject to internal heating and sidewall cooling, are studied both in the laboratory and in numerical simulations. The performance of the numerical model is verified quantitatively to within a few per cent in several cases by direct comparison with measurements in the laboratory of temperature and horizontal velocity fields in the axisymmetric and regular wave regimes. The basic azimuthal mean flow produced by this distribution of heat sources and sinks leads to strips of potential vorticity in which the radial gradient of potential vorticity changes sign in both the vertical and horizontal directions. From diagnosis of the energy budget of numerical simulations, the principal instability of the flow is shown to be predominantly baroclinic in nature, though with a non-negligible contribution towards the maintenance of the non-axisymmetric flow components from the barotropic wave–zonal flow interaction. The structure of the regime diagram for the internally heated baroclinic waves is shown to have some aspects in common with conventional wall-heated annulus waves, but the former shows no evidence for time-dependence in the form of ‘amplitude vacillation’. Internally heated flows instead evidently prefer to make transitions between wavenumbers in the regular regime via a form of vortex merging and/or splitting, indicating a mixed vortex/wave character to the non-axisymmetric flows in this system. The transition towards irregular flow occurs via a form of wavenumber vacillation, also involving vortex splitting and merging events. Baroclinic eddies are shown to develop from an initial axisymmetric flow via a mixed sinuous/varicose instability, leading to the formation of detached vortices of the same sign as the ambient axisymmetric potential vorticity at that level, in a manner which resembles recent simulations of atmospheric baroclinic frontal instability and varicose barotropic instabilities. Dye tracer experiments confirm the mixed wave/vortex character of the equilibrated instabilities, and exhibit chaotic advection in time-dependent flows.

Numerical Simulations of Forced Shallow-Water Turbulence: Effects of Moist Convection on the Large-Scale Circulation of Jupiter and Saturn

2007 ◽  
Vol 64 (9) ◽  
pp. 3132-3157 ◽  
Author(s):  
Adam P. Showman
Keyword(s):  
Numerical Simulations ◽  
Shallow Water ◽  
Shallow Water Equations ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Spherical Geometry ◽  
Small Deformation ◽  
Moist Convection ◽  
Zonal Jets ◽  
Strong Control ◽  
Water Turbulence

Abstract To test the hypothesis that the zonal jets on Jupiter and Saturn result from energy injected by thunderstorms into the cloud layer, forced-dissipative numerical simulations of the shallow-water equations in spherical geometry are presented. The forcing consists of sporadic, isolated circular mass pulses intended to represent thunderstorms; the damping, representing radiation, removes mass evenly from the layer. These results show that the deformation radius provides strong control over the behavior. At deformation radii &lt;2000 km (0.03 Jupiter radii), the simulations produce broad jets near the equator, but regions poleward of 15°–30° latitude instead become dominated by vortices. However, simulations at deformation radii &gt;4000 km (0.06 Jupiter radii) become dominated by barotropically stable zonal jets with only weak vortices. The lack of midlatitude jets at a small deformation radii results from the suppression of the beta effect by column stretching; this effect has been previously documented in the quasigeostrophic system but never before in the full shallow-water system. In agreement with decaying shallow-water turbulence simulations, but in disagreement with Jupiter and Saturn, the equatorial flows in these forced simulations are always westward. In analogy with purely two-dimensional turbulence, the size of the coherent structures (jets and vortices) depends on the relative strengths of forcing and damping; stronger damping removes energy faster as it cascades upscale, leading to smaller vortices and more closely spaced jets in the equilibrated state. Forcing and damping parameters relevant to Jupiter produce flows with speeds up to 50–200 m s−1 and a predominance of anticyclones over cyclones, both in agreement with observations. However, the dominance of vortices over jets at deformation radii thought to be relevant to Jupiter (1000–3000 km) suggests that either the actual deformation radius is larger than previously believed or that three-dimensional effects, not included in the shallow-water equations, alter the dynamics in a fundamental manner.

scholarly journals Is the Coefficient of Eddy Potential Vorticity Diffusion Positive? Part I: Barotropic Zonal Channel

2018 ◽  
Vol 48 (7) ◽  
pp. 1589-1607 ◽  
Author(s):  
V. O. Ivchenko ◽  
V. B. Zalesny ◽  
B. Sinha
Keyword(s):  
Potential Vorticity ◽  
Independent Solution ◽  
Zonal Flow ◽  
Momentum Balance ◽  
Eddy Fluxes ◽  
The Mean ◽  
Zonal Momentum Balance ◽  
Circumpolar Current ◽  
The Antarctic ◽  
Zonal Momentum

AbstractThe question of whether the coefficient of diffusivity of potential vorticity by mesoscale eddies is positive is studied for a zonally reentrant barotropic channel using the quasigeostrophic approach. The topography is limited to the first mode in the meridional direction but is unlimited in the zonal direction. We derive an analytic solution for the stationary (time independent) solution. New terms associated with parameterized eddy fluxes of potential vorticity appear both in the equations for the mean zonal momentum balance and in the kinetic energy balance. These terms are linked with the topographic form stress exerted by parameterized eddies. It is demonstrated that in regimes with zonal flow (analogous to the Antarctic Circumpolar Current), the coefficient of eddy potential vorticity diffusivity must be positive.

scholarly journals An Adiabatic Mechanism for the Reduction of Jet Meander Amplitude by Potential Vorticity Filamentation

2018 ◽  
Vol 75 (12) ◽  
pp. 4091-4106 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ben Harvey ◽  
John Methven ◽  
Maarten H. P. Ambaum
Keyword(s):  
Decay Rate ◽  
Rossby Wave ◽  
Potential Vorticity ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Rossby Waves ◽  
Weather Forecasting ◽  
Single Layer ◽  
Jet Streams ◽  
Rapid Reduction ◽  
Simple Method

Abstract The amplitude of ridges in large-amplitude Rossby waves has been shown to decrease systematically with lead time during the first 1–5 days of operational global numerical weather forecasts. These models also exhibit a rapid reduction in the isentropic gradient of potential vorticity (PV) at the tropopause during the first 1–2 days of forecasts. This paper identifies a mechanism linking the reduction in large-scale meander amplitude on jet streams to declining PV gradients. The mechanism proposed is that a smoother isentropic transition of PV across the tropopause leads to excessive PV filamentation on the jet flanks and a more lossy waveguide. The approach taken is to analyze Rossby wave dynamics in a single-layer quasigeostrophic model. Numerical simulations show that the amplitude of a Rossby wave propagating along a narrow but smooth PV front does indeed decay transiently with time. This process is explained in terms of the filamentation of PV from the jet core and associated absorption of wave activity by the critical layers on the jet flanks, and a simple method for quantitatively predicting the magnitude of the amplitude reduction without simulation is presented. Explicitly diffusive simulations are then used to show that the combined impact of diffusion and the adiabatic rearrangement of PV can result in a decay rate of Rossby waves that is 2–4 times as fast as could be expected from diffusion acting alone. This predicted decay rate is sufficient to explain the decay observed in operational weather forecasting models.

scholarly journals The decay of cyclonic eddies by Rossby wave radiation

1998 ◽  
Vol 361 ◽  
pp. 237-252 ◽  
Author(s):  
N. ROBB McDONALD
Keyword(s):  
Shallow Water ◽  
Explicit Expression ◽  
Energy Flux ◽  
Rossby Wave ◽  
Potential Vorticity ◽  
Phase Speed ◽  
Wave Radiation ◽  
Conservation Of Energy ◽  
Radiation Induced ◽  
General Method

It is argued that because shallow water cyclones on a β-plane drift westward at a speed equal to an available Rossby wave phase speed, they must radiate energy and cannot, therefore, be steady. The form of the Rossby wave wake accompanying a quasi-steady cyclone is calculated and the energy flux in the radiated waves determined. Further, an explicit expression for the radiation-induced northward drift of the cyclone is obtained. A general method for determining the effects of the radiation on the radius and amplitude of the vortex based on conservation of energy and potential vorticity is given. An example calculation for a cyclone with a ‘top-hat’ profile is presented, demonstrating that the primary effect of the radiation is to decrease the radius of the vortex. The dimensional timescale associated with the decay of oceanic vortices is of the order of several months to a year.

The propagation of atmospheric Rossby gravity waves in latitudinally sheared zonal flows

1977 ◽  
Vol 287 (1340) ◽  
pp. 115-143 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Gravity Waves ◽  
Rossby Waves ◽  
Zonal Flow ◽  
Flow Speed ◽  
Wave Number ◽  
Mean Flow ◽  
Zonal Flows ◽  
Planetary Scale ◽  
The Mean ◽  
Critical Latitude

Using the B-plane approximation we formulate the equations which govern small perturbations in a rotating atmosphere and describe a wide class of possible wave motions, in the presence of a background zonal flow, ranging from ‘moderately high’ frequency acoustic-gravity-inertial waves to ‘low’ frequency planetary-scale (Rossby) waves. The discussion concentrates mainly on the propagation properties of Rossby waves in various types of latitudinally sheared zonal flows which occur at different heights and seasons in the earth’s atmosphere. However, it is first shown that gravity waves in a latitudinally sheared zonal flow exhibit critical latitude behaviour where the ‘intrinsic ’ wave frequency matches the Brunt-Vaisala frequency (in contrast to the case of gravity waves in a vertically sheared flow where a critical layer exists where the horizontal wave phase speed equals the flow speed) and that the wave behaviour near such a latitude is similar to that of Rossby waves in the vicinity of their critical latitudes which occur where the ‘intrinsic’ wave frequency approaches zero. In the absence of zonal flow in the atmosphere the geometry of the planetary wave dispersion equation (which is described by a highly elongated ellipsoid in wave-number vector space) implies that energy propagates almost parallel to the /--planes. This feature may provide a reason why there seems to be so little coupling between planetary scale motions in the lower and upper atmosphere. Planetary waves can be made to propagate eastward, as well as westward, if they are evanescent in the vertical direction. The W.K.B. approximation, which provides an approximate description of wave propagation in slowly varying zonal wind shears, shows that the distortion of the wave-number surface caused by the zonal flow controls the dependence of the wave amplitude on the zonal flow speed. In particular it follows that Rossby waves propagating into regions of strengthening westerlies are intensified in amplitude whereas those waves propagating into strengthening easterlies are diminished in amplitude. A classification of the various types of ray trajectories that arise in zonal flow profiles occurring in the Earth’s atmosphere, such as jet-like variations of westerly or easterly zonal flow or a belt of westerlies bounded by a belt of easterlies, is given, and provides the conditions giving rise to such phenomena as critical latitude behaviour and wave trapping. In a westerly flow there is a tendency for the combined effects on wave propagation of jet-like variations of B and zonal flow speed to counteract each other, whereas in an easterly flow such variations tend to reinforce each other. An examination of the reflexion and refraction of Rossby waves at a sharp jump in the zonal flow speed shows that under certain conditions wave amplification, or over-reflexion, can arise with the implication that the reflected wave can extract energy from the background streaming motion. On the other hand the wave behaviour near critical latitudes, which can be described in terms of a discontinuous jump in the ‘wave invariant’, shows that such latitudes can act as either wave absorbers (in which case the mean flow is accelerated there) or wave emitters (in which case the mean flow is decelerated there).

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