Gravity and Inertia-Gravity Internal Waves: Breaking Processes and Induced Mixing

Staquet, Chantal

doi:10.1007/s10712-003-1280-8

Cited by 13 publications

(8 citation statements)

References 75 publications

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“…Wave breaking in the interior of a flow without any dissipation only redistributes the potential vorticity (PV) field without modifying the total PV [ Haynes and McIntyre , , ; McIntyre and Norton , ], which is not the case near the surface in the SABL where PV can be generated. The theory of wave steepening and breaking is thoroughly reviewed by Staquet and Sommeria [], Staquet [], and Achatz [].…”

Section: Review Of Theories Of Waves and Turbulence And Their Interacmentioning

confidence: 99%

Review of wave‐turbulence interactions in the stable atmospheric boundary layer

Sun

Nappo²,

Mahrt

et al. 2015

Reviews of Geophysics

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137

124

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Flow in a stably stratified environment is characterized by anisotropic and intermittent turbulence and wavelike motions of varying amplitudes and periods. Understanding turbulence intermittency and wave-turbulence interactions in a stably stratified flow remains a challenging issue in geosciences including planetary atmospheres and oceans. The stable atmospheric boundary layer (SABL) commonly occurs when the ground surface is cooled by longwave radiation emission such as at night over land surfaces, or even daytime over snow and ice surfaces, and when warm air is advected over cold surfaces. Intermittent turbulence intensification in the SABL impacts human activities and weather variability, yet it cannot be generated in state-of-the-art numerical forecast models. This failure is mainly due to a lack of understanding of the physical mechanisms for seemingly random turbulence generation in a stably stratified flow, in which wave-turbulence interaction is a potential mechanism for turbulence intermittency. A workshop on wave-turbulence interactions in the SABL addressed the current understanding and challenges of wave-turbulence interactions and the role of wavelike motions in contributing to anisotropic and intermittent turbulence from the perspectives of theory, observations, and numerical parameterization. There have been a number of reviews on waves, and a few on turbulence in stably stratified flows, but not much on wave-turbulence interactions. This review focuses on the nocturnal SABL; however, the discussions here on intermittent turbulence and wave-turbulence interactions in stably stratified flows underscore important issues in stably stratified geophysical dynamics in general.

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Section: Review Of Theories Of Waves and Turbulence And Their Interacmentioning

confidence: 99%

Review of wave‐turbulence interactions in the stable atmospheric boundary layer

Sun

Nappo²,

Mahrt

et al. 2015

Reviews of Geophysics

Self Cite

137

124

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“…Waveturbulence interactions have been theoretically investigated at wave critical levels, where wind speed equals wave phase speed (e.g., Geller et al 1975;Nappo and Chimonas 1992;Dörnbrack and Nappo 1997;Tjernström et al 2009). Waves with large amplitudes can also lead to turbulence through nonlinearity (e.g., Staquet and Sommeria 2002;Staquet 2004). However, most studies focus on wave breaking, with little discussion on how turbulence affects wave characteristics.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Wind and Temperature Oscillations Generated by Wave–Turbulence Interactions in the Stably Stratified Boundary Layer

Sun

Mahrt

Nappo

et al. 2015

Journal of the Atmospheric Sciences

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The authors investigate atmospheric internal gravity waves (IGWs): their generation and induction of global intermittent turbulence in the nocturnal stable atmospheric boundary layer based on the new concept of turbulence generation discussed in a prior paper by Sun et al. The IGWs are generated by air lifted by convergence forced by the colliding background flow and cold currents near the ground. The buoyancy-forced IGWs enhance wind speed at the wind speed wave crests such that the bulk shear instability generates large coherent eddies, which augment local turbulent mixing and vertically redistribute momentum and heat. The periodically enhanced turbulent mixing, in turn, modifies the air temperature and flow oscillations of the original IGWs. These turbulence-forced oscillations (TFOs) resemble waves and coherently transport momentum and sensible heat. The observed momentum and sensible heat fluxes at the IGW frequency, which are due to either the buoyancy-forced IGWs themselves or the TFOs, are larger than turbulent fluxes near the surface. The IGWs enhance not only the bulk shear at the wave crests, but also local shear over the wind speed troughs of the surface IGWs. Temporal and spatial variations of turbulent mixing as a result of this wave-induced turbulent mixing change the mean airflow and the shape of the IGWs.

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“…By keeping wave amplitudes small, convective and/or shear instability are avoided. Low amplitudes are justified since most oceanic internal waves have small steepness (Staquet 2004). After storm events, oceanic near-inertial waves can have vertical shears of 6.5 3 10 23 s 21 (Sundermeyer 1998;MacKinnon and Gregg 2005); this is twice as large as our largest vertical shear of 3.6 3 10 23 s 21 .…”

Section: B Initial Conditions and Forcingmentioning

confidence: 92%

Upscale Energy Transfer by the Vortical Mode and Internal Waves

Brunner-Suzuki

Sundermeyer

Lelong

2014

Journal of Physical Oceanography

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Diapycnal mixing in the ocean is sporadic yet ubiquitous, leading to patches of mixing on a variety of scales. The adjustment of such mixed patches can lead to the formation of vortices and other small-scale geostrophic motions, which are thought to enhance lateral diffusivity. If vortices are densely populated, they can interact and merge, and upscale energy transfer can occur. Vortex interaction can also be modified by internal waves, thus impacting upscale transfer. Numerical experiments were used to study the effect of a large-scale near-inertial internal wave on a field of submesoscale vortices. While one might expect a vertical shear to limit the vertical scale of merging vortices, it was found that internal wave shear did not disrupt upscale energy transfer. Rather, under certain conditions, it enhanced upscale transfer by enhancing vortex–vortex interaction. If vortices were so densely populated that they interacted even in the absence of a wave, adding a forced large-scale wave enhanced the existing upscale transfer. Results further suggest that continuous forcing by the main driving mechanism (either vortices or internal waves) is necessary to maintain such upscale transfer. These findings could help to improve understanding of the direction of energy transfer in submesoscale oceanic processes.

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Gravity and Inertia-Gravity Internal Waves: Breaking Processes and Induced Mixing

Cited by 13 publications

References 75 publications

Review of wave‐turbulence interactions in the stable atmospheric boundary layer

Review of wave‐turbulence interactions in the stable atmospheric boundary layer

Wind and Temperature Oscillations Generated by Wave–Turbulence Interactions in the Stably Stratified Boundary Layer

Upscale Energy Transfer by the Vortical Mode and Internal Waves

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