An analysis of the topographical effect on turbulence and diffusion in the atmosphere's boundary layer

Kao, S. K.; Lee, H. N.; Smidy, K. I.

doi:10.1007/bf02153555

Cited by 5 publications

(1 citation statement)

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“…The contribution of drainage flows to filling the basin cold pool are described by Geiger (1965), King (1989), andAllwine et al (1992), and the role of drainage flows in the transport of atmospheric tracer material within the cold pool was investigated by Allwine et al (1992). Other studies of processes in mountain basins include Kao et al (1975) in the Great Salt Lake basin; cold-pool development studies in smaller basins, including Colorado's Sinbad basin (Whiteman et al 1996;Fast et al 1996) and in Utah's Peter Sinks basin (Clements et al 2003); and morning cold-pool breakup studies of Banta and Cotton (1981), Banta (1984Banta ( , 1985Banta ( , 1986, and Kelly (1988).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Nocturnal Low-Level Jet in a Mountain Basin Complex. Part I: Evolution and Effects on Local Flows

Banta¹,

Darby²,

Fast

et al. 2004

Journal of Applied Meteorology

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A Doppler lidar deployed to the center of the Great Salt Lake (GSL) basin during the Vertical Transport and Mixing (VTMX) field campaign in October 2000 found a diurnal cycle of the along-basin winds with northerly up-basin flow during the day and a southerly down-basin low-level jet at night. The emphasis of VTMX was on stable atmospheric processes in the cold-air pool that formed in the basin at night. During the night the jet was fully formed as it entered the GSL basin from the south. Thus, it was a feature of the complex string of basins draining toward the Great Salt Lake, which included at least the Utah Lake basin to the south. The timing of the evening reversal to down-basin flow was sensitive to the larger-scale north–south pressure gradient imposed on the basin complex. On nights when the pressure gradient was not too strong, local drainage flow (slope flows and canyon outflow) was well developed along the Wasatch Range to the east and coexisted with the basin jet. The coexistence of these two types of flow generated localized regions of convergence and divergence, in which regions of vertical motion and transport were focused. Mesoscale numerical simulations captured these features and indicated that updrafts on the order of 5 cm s−1 could persist in these localized convergence zones, contributing to vertical displacement of air masses within the basin cold pool.

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