A computational study of turbulent kinetic energy transport in barotropic turbulence on the f-plane

Journal Article · Thu Oct 15 00:00:00 EDT 2015 · Physics of Fluids (1994)

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1063/1.4934623· OSTI ID:22482446

Grooms, Ian ^[1]

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1. Center for Atmosphere Ocean Science, Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences, New York University, New York, New York 10012 (United States)

Energy transport by eddies is diagnosed from a series of simulations of stochastically forced, inhomogeneous two-dimensional turbulence—barotropic dynamics on the f-plane. The divergence of the energy flux is compared to diffusive models, both fractional and harmonic, and the inferred diffusivity κ is compared to a mixing-length model κ ∝ Vℓ where V and ℓ are eddy velocity and length scales, respectively. The flux-divergence is found to be well approximated by Laplacian diffusion with a mixing-length approximation. This study provides some support for diffusive modeling of mesoscale eddy energy transport in ocean model parameterizations.

• OSTI ID: 22482446
• Journal Information: Physics of Fluids (1994), Vol. 27, Issue 10; Other Information: (c) 2015 AIP Publishing LLC; Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); ISSN 1070-6631
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS
GENERAL PHYSICS
KINETIC ENERGY
LAPLACIAN
LENGTH
MIXING
POWER TRANSMISSION
SIMULATION
STOCHASTIC PROCESSES
TURBULENCE