James R. Maddison

A Framework for Parameterizing Eddy Potential Vorticity Fluxes

A framework for parameterizing eddy potential vorticity fluxes is developed that is consistent with conservation of energy and momentum while retaining the symmetries of the original eddy flux. The framework involves rewriting the residual-mean eddy force, or equivalently the eddy potential vorticity flux, as the divergence of an eddy stress tensor. A norm of this tensor is bounded by the eddy energy, allowing the components of the stress tensor to be rewritten in terms of the eddy energy and nondimensional parameters describing the mean shape and orientation of the eddies. If a prognostic equation is solved for the eddy energy, the remaining unknowns are nondimensional and bounded in magnitude by unity. Moreover, these nondimensional geometric parameters have strong connections with classical stability theory. When applied to the Eady problem, it is shown that the new framework preserves the functional form of the Eady growth rate for linear instability. Moreover, in the limit in which Reynolds stresses are neglected, the framework reduces to a Gent and McWilliams type of eddy closure where the eddy diffusivity can be interpreted as the form proposed by Visbeck et al. Simulations of three-layer wind-driven gyres are used to diagnose the eddy shape and orientations in fully developed geostrophic turbulence. These fields are found to have large-scale structure that appears related to the structure of the mean flow. The eddy energy sets the magnitude of the eddy stress tensor and hence the eddy potential vorticity fluxes. Possible extensions of the framework to ensure potential vorticity is mixed on average are discussed.

Eddy saturation and frictional control of the Antarctic Circumpolar Current

The Antarctic Circumpolar Current is the strongest current in the ocean and has a pivotal impact on ocean stratification, heat content, and carbon content. The circumpolar volume transport is relatively insensitive to surface wind forcing in models that resolve turbulent ocean eddies, a process termed “eddy saturation.” Here a simple model is presented that explains the physics of eddy saturation with three ingredients: a momentum budget, a relation between the eddy form stress and eddy energy, and an eddy energy budget. The model explains both the insensitivity of circumpolar volume transport to surface wind stress and the increase of eddy energy with wind stress. The model further predicts that circumpolar transport increases with increased bottom friction, a counterintuitive result that is confirmed in eddy-permitting calculations. These results suggest an unexpected and important impact of eddy energy dissipation, through bottom drag or lee wave generation, on ocean stratification, ocean heat content, and potentially atmospheric CO2.

Directional integration on unstructured meshes via supermesh construction

Unstructured meshes are in widespread use throughout computational physics, but calculating diagnostics of simulations on such meshes can be challenging. For example, in geophysical fluid dynamics, it is frequently desirable to compute directional integrals such as vertical integrals and zonal averages; however, it is difficult to compute these on meshes with no inherent spatial structure. This is widely regarded as an obstacle to the adoption of unstructured mesh numerical modelling in this field. In this paper, we describe an algorithm by which one can exactly compute such directional integrals on arbitrarily unstructured meshes. This is achieved via the solution of a problem of computational geometry, constructing the supermesh of two meshes. We demonstrate the utility of this approach by applying it to a classical geophysical fluid dynamics system: the thermally driven rotating annulus. This addresses an important objection to the more widespread use of unstructured mesh modelling.

Geostrophic balance preserving interpolation in mesh adaptive linearised shallow-water ocean modelling

Abstract The accurate representation of geostrophic balance is an essential requirement for numerical modelling of geophysical flows. Significant effort is often put into the selection of accurate or optimal balance representation by the discretisation of the fundamental equations. The issue of accurate balance representation is particularly challenging when applying dynamic mesh adaptivity, where there is potential for additional imbalance injection when interpolating to new, optimised meshes. In the context of shallow-water modelling, we present a new method for preservation of geostrophic balance when applying dynamic mesh adaptivity. This approach is based upon interpolation of the Helmholtz decomposition of the Coriolis acceleration. We apply this in combination with a discretisation for which states in geostrophic balance are exactly steady solutions of the linearised equations on an f-plane; this method guarantees that a balanced and steady flow on a donor mesh remains balanced and steady after interpolation onto an arbitrary target mesh, to within machine precision. We further demonstrate the utility of this interpolant for states close to geostrophic balance, and show that it prevents pollution of the resulting solutions by imbalanced perturbations introduced by the interpolation.

A Geometric Interpretation of Eddy Reynolds Stresses in Barotropic Ocean Jets

AbstractBarotropic eddy fluxes are analyzed through a geometric decomposition of the eddy stress tensor. Specifically, the geometry of the eddy variance ellipse, a two-dimensional visualization of the stress tensor describing the mean eddy shape and tilt, is used to elucidate eddy propagation and eddy feedback on the mean flow. Linear shear and jet profiles are analyzed and theoretical results are compared against fully nonlinear simulations. For flows with zero planetary vorticity gradient, analytic solutions for the eddy ellipse tilt and anisotropy are obtained that provide a direct relationship between the eddy tilt and the phase difference of a normal-mode solution. This allows a straightforward interpretation of the eddy–mean flow interaction in terms of classical stability theory: the initially unstable jet gives rise to eddies that are tilted “against the shear” and extract energy from the mean flow; once the jet stabilizes, eddies become tilted “with the shear” and return their energy to the mean ...

Optimal Constrained Interpolation in Mesh-Adaptive Finite Element Modeling

Mesh-to-mesh Galerkin

Conservative interpolation between volume meshes by local Galerkin projection

L^2

The Eliassen–Palm flux tensor

projection allows piecewise polynomial unstructured finite element data to be interpolated between two nonmatching unstructured meshes of the same domain. The interpolation is by definition optimal in an

Spud 1.0: generalising and automating the user interfaces of scientific computer models

L^2

Accurate representation of geostrophic and hydrostatic balance in unstructured mesh finite element ocean modelling

sense, and subject to fairly weak assumptions conserves the integral of an interpolated function. However other properties, such as the