scholarly journals WAVES AND STRONGLY SHEARED CURRENTS: EXTENSIONS TO COASTAL OCEAN MODELS

Author(s):  
Saeideh Banihashemi ◽  
James T. Kirby ◽  
Fengyan Shi ◽  
Zhifei Dong

Significant progress has been made in the numerical modeling of wave-current interaction during the past decade. Typical coastal circulation and wave models, however, still only employ theoretical formulations which take depth-uniform mean flows into account, with realistic, non-uniform flows treated as being depth uniform through some chosen averaging procedure. Depending on the choice of average over depth, significant errors may arise in the estimation of properties such as group velocity and action density in realistic conditions. These errors, in turn, are fed back into the circulation model through incorrect representation of the vertical structure of wave forcing. A new framework for wave-current interaction theory for strongly sheared mean flows has been developed using vortex force formalism by Dong (2016). The resulting formulation leads to a conservation law for wave action identical to that of Voronovich (1976), and to expressions for wave-averaged forces in the Craik-Leibovich vortex force formalism. In this study, we are completing the development of a coupled NHWAVE/SWAN which implements the wave forcing formulation of Dong (2016) in a wave-averaged version of the non-hydrostatic model NHWAVE (Ma et al., 2012). The SWAN model is also being extended to incorporate a better representation of frequency and direction-dependent group velocity and intrinsic frequency in the neighborhood of the spectral peak, thus improving on the present practice of using quantities evaluated only at the spectral peak. The resulting model is being tested against field data collected in several recent experiments involving strong, vertically sheared currents in river mouths or straits.

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christoph Geißler ◽  
Christoph Jacobi ◽  
Friederike Lilienthal

Abstract. We used a nonlinear mechanistic global circulation model to analyze the migrating quarterdiurnal tide (QDT) in the middle atmosphere with focus on its possible forcing mechanisms. These are absorption of solar radiation by ozone and water vapor, nonlinear tidal interactions, and gravity wave-tide interactions. We show a climatology of the QDT amplitudes, and we examined the contribution of the different forcing mechanisms on the QDT amplitude. To this end, we first extracted the QDT in the model tendency terms. Then, we separately removed the QDT contribution in different tendency terms. We find that the solar forcing mechanism is the most important one for the QDT, but also the nonlinear and gravity wave forcing mechanism play a role in certain seasons, latitudes and altitudes. Furthermore, destructive interference between the individual forcing mechanisms are observed. Therefore, tidal amplitudes partly become even larger in simulations with removed nonlinear or gravity wave forcing mechanism.


2016 ◽  
Vol 73 (8) ◽  
pp. 3213-3226 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alvaro de la Cámara ◽  
François Lott ◽  
Valérian Jewtoukoff ◽  
Riwal Plougonven ◽  
Albert Hertzog

Abstract The austral stratospheric final warming date is often predicted with substantial delay in several climate models. This systematic error is generally attributed to insufficient parameterized gravity wave (GW) drag in the stratosphere around 60°S. A simulation with a general circulation model [Laboratoire de Météorologie Dynamique zoom model (LMDZ)] with a much less pronounced bias is used to analyze the contribution of the different types of waves to the dynamics of the final warming. For this purpose, the resolved and unresolved wave forcing of the middle atmosphere during the austral spring are examined in LMDZ and reanalysis data, and a good agreement is found between the two datasets. The role of parameterized orographic and nonorographic GWs in LMDZ is further examined, and it is found that orographic and nonorographic GWs contribute evenly to the GW forcing in the stratosphere, unlike in other climate models, where orographic GWs are the main contributor. This result is shown to be in good agreement with GW-resolving operational analysis products. It is demonstrated that the significant contribution of the nonorographic GWs is due to highly intermittent momentum fluxes produced by the source-related parameterizations used in LMDZ, in qualitative agreement with recent observations. This yields sporadic high-amplitude GWs that break in the stratosphere and force the circulation at lower altitudes than more homogeneously distributed nonorographic GW parameterizations do.


By the use of a Hamiltonian formulation, a basic group velocity is defined as the derivative of frequency with respect to wavenumber keeping action density constant, and is shown to represent an incremental action velocity in the general nonlinear case. The stability treatment of Whitham and Lighthill is extended to several dimensions. The water-wave analysis of Whitham (1967 a ) is extended to two space dimensions, and is shown to predict oblique­-mode instabilities for kh < 1.36. A treatment of Lighthill’s (1965) solution in the one­-dimensional elliptic case resolves the problem of the energy distribution in the solution past the critical time. A note on diffraction effects on quasilinear solutions of the Whitham type is presented.


2019 ◽  
Vol 77 (1) ◽  
pp. 149-165 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yixiong Lu ◽  
Tongwen Wu ◽  
Weihua Jie ◽  
Adam A. Scaife ◽  
Martin B. Andrews ◽  
...  

Abstract It is well known that the stratospheric quasi-biennial oscillation (QBO) is forced by equatorial waves with different horizontal/vertical scales, including Kelvin waves, mixed Rossby–gravity (MRG) waves, inertial gravity waves (GWs), and mesoscale GWs, but the relative contribution of each wave is currently not very clear. Proper representation of these waves is critical to the simulation of the QBO in general circulation models (GCMs). In this study, the vertical resolution in the Beijing Climate Center Atmospheric General Circulation Model (BCC-AGCM) is increased to better represent large-scale waves, and a mesoscale GW parameterization scheme, which is coupled to the convective sources, is implemented to provide unresolved wave forcing of the QBO. Results show that BCC-AGCM can spontaneously generate the QBO with realistic periods, amplitudes, and asymmetric features between westerly and easterly phases. There are significant spatiotemporal variations of parameterized convective GWs, largely contributing to a great degree of variability in the simulated QBO. In the eastward wind shear of the QBO at 20 hPa, forcing provided by resolved waves is 0.1–0.2 m s−1 day−1 and forcing provided by parameterized GWs is ~0.15 m s−1 day−1. On the other hand, westward forcings by resolved waves and parameterized GWs are ~0.1 and 0.4–0.5 m s−1 day−1, respectively. It is inferred that the eastward forcing of the QBO is provided by both Kelvin waves and mesoscale convective GWs, whereas the westward forcing is largely provided by mesoscale GWs. MRG waves barely contribute to the formation of the QBO in the model.


2012 ◽  
Vol 1 (33) ◽  
pp. 2 ◽  
Author(s):  
Zhifei Dong ◽  
James T. Kirby

The application of wave-current interaction theory in ocean circulation models has been extensively developed over the past decade, with formulations extended to three dimensions and based either on radiation stress formulations or on the Craik-Leibovich formulation. However, few of these studies consider the interaction of waves with relatively strongly sheared current, in which current shear can affect linear wave dynamics at leading order. The problem arises from the study of the evolution of highly concentrated sediment plumes developing at the mouth of small mountainous rivers. Although the annually averaged discharge of these small mountainous rivers is trivial compared to large rivers, during the extreme flooding events triggered by typhoon or tropic cyclones, these rivers, most of which located at tectonically active mountain belts, can carry highly concentrated sediment ( up to several g/l in the river plume) into the ocean. The magnitude of river discharge velocity at the river mouth may reach several m/s, comparable to the wave phase speed in coastal water. In addition, these flooding events usually coincide with very energetic wave conditions induced by the storms. Therefore, the interaction of waves with strongly sheared current becomes a very important dynamic process at this kind of river plumes. In our study, we establish a new framework to describe the interaction of small amplitude surface gravity waves and strongly sheared currents, where shear can exist in both vertical and horizontal directions. To begin with, we limit the derivation to the case of a narrow-banded slowly varying wave train propagating shoreward in the coastal ocean outside of the surf zone. Accordingly, our problem is assumed to be finite depth without wave breaking. Later we can extend the formulation to describe a spectrum of surface waves and include wave energy dissipation. In contrast to existing formulations, where waves at most feel a weighted depth-average current which follows from a weak-current, weak-shear approximation, the present formulation allows for an arbitrary degree of vertical shear, leading to a description of the vertical structure of waves in terms of solutions to the Rayleigh stability equation. The resulting formulation leads to a conservation law for wave action, and forcing terms for the description of mean flow using the Craik-Leibovich vortex force formulation. This new framework of wave-current interaction can be applied to numerical model based on ROMS/SWAN to study dynamics in coastal waters.


2006 ◽  
Vol 63 (11) ◽  
pp. 2931-2947 ◽  
Author(s):  
Heiner Körnich ◽  
Gerhard Schmitz ◽  
Erich Becker

Abstract The influence of stationary waves on the maintenance of the tropospheric annular mode (AM) is examined in a simple global circulation model with perpetual January conditions. The presented model experiments vary in the configurations of stationary wave forcing by orography and land–sea heating contrasts. All simulations display an AM-like pattern in the lower troposphere. The zonal momentum budget shows that the feedback between eddies with periods less than 10 days and the zonal-mean zonal wind is generally the dominating process that maintains the AM. The kinetic energy of the high-frequency eddies depends on the stationary wave forcing, where orographic forcing reduces and thermal forcing enhances it. The AMs in the model experiments differ in the superposed anomalous stationary waves and in the strength of the zonally symmetric component. If only orographic stationary wave forcing is taken into account, the mountain torque decelerates the barotropic wind anomaly, and thus acts to weaken the AM. However, the combined forcing of orography and land–sea heating contrasts produces a feedback between the anomalous stationary waves and the AM that compensates for the mountain torque. The different behavior of the model experiments results from the fact that only the thermal forcing changes the character of the anomalous stationary waves from external Rossby waves for orographic forcing alone to vertically propagating waves that enable the feedback process through wave–mean flow interaction. Only with this feedback, which is shown to be due to linear zonal–eddy coupling, does the model display a strong AM with centers of action over the oceans. The main conclusions are that this process is necessary to simulate a realistic northern AM, and that it distinguishes the northern from the southern AM.


2012 ◽  
Vol 2012 ◽  
pp. 1-13
Author(s):  
Jinhai Zheng ◽  
Tianwen Wang ◽  
Gang Wang ◽  
Chenming Zhang ◽  
Chi Zhang

A two-way coupling algorithm for wave-current interaction is developed and implemented into a nearshore circulation model to investigate the effects of fully wave-current interaction on irregular wave transformation over an elliptic shoal. The wave field is simulated by a spectral wave model WABED, and the wave-induced current is solved by a quasi-three-dimensional model WINCM. The surface roller effects are represented in the formulation of surface stress, and the roller characteristics are solved by a roller evolution model. The proposed two-way coupling algorithm can describe both the generation of wave-induced current and the current-induced wave transformation, which is more physically reasonable than the one-way approaches. The model test with a laboratory experiment shows that wave-induced currents have an important influence on the wave transformation, for example, the wave energy defocusing due to the strong jet-like current along the centerline of the shoal. It is revealed that the accuracy of simulated wave field can be significantly improved by taking into account the two-way wave-current interaction.


2016 ◽  
Vol 73 (5) ◽  
pp. 1871-1887 ◽  
Author(s):  
Krzysztof Wargan ◽  
Lawrence Coy

Abstract The behavior of the tropopause inversion layer (TIL) during the 2009 sudden stratospheric warming (SSW) is analyzed using NASA’s Modern-Era Retrospective Analysis for Research and Applications, version 2 (MERRA-2), and short-term simulations with the MERRA-2 general circulation model. Consistent with previous studies, it is found that static stability in a shallow layer above the polar tropopause sharply increases following the SSW, leading to a strengthening of the high-latitude TIL. Simultaneously, the height of the thermal tropopause decreases by around 1 km. Similar behavior is also detected during other major SSW events between the years 2004 and 2013. Using an ensemble of general circulation model forecasts initialized from MERRA-2, it is demonstrated that the primary cause of the strengthening of the TIL is an increased convergence of the vertical component of the stratospheric residual circulation in response to an SSW-induced acceleration of the mean downward motion between 75° and 90°N. In addition, ~6% of the strengthening in 2009 is attributed to an enhanced anticyclonic circulation at the tropopause. A preliminary analysis indicates that during other recent SSW events there was a significant increase in the convergence of the vertical residual wind velocity throughout the middle and lower stratosphere. The static stability increase simulated by the model during the 2009 SSW is 60%–80% of that seen in MERRA-2. The underestimate is traced back to a tendency for the forecasts to underestimate the resolved planetary wave forcing on the stratosphere compared to the reanalysis.


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