Numerical Studies of Convection Currents at the Ocean's Surface Caused by Evaporation, Radiation and Atmospheric Cooling

摘要

Numerical experiments were performed on convective flows that arise at the ocean's surface undergoing evaporation, long-wave back-radiation and atmospheric cooling. Two specific problems were treated, with greatly different characteristic length scales. To simulate large-scale motions, convection currents have been treated that arise when fluid in a rectangular geometry is rotated with constant angular velocity and cooled with uniform heat flux both from above and below. For Rayleigh number of about 28,000 and Taylor number about 10,000, the time development of the mean-square vorticity components showed equipartition for circulations in all planes. An examination of the horizontal platforms of motion revealed the existence of a weak, four-lobed jet stream meandering around four centers of strong, closed cyclonic circulations. To simulate small-scale motions, two-dimensional, penetrative thermohaline convection was studied for situations which correspond to evaporative cooling of a stably stratified liquid. (Author)