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Finescale strain parameterization (FSP) of turbulent kinetic energy dissipation rate has become a widely used method for observing ocean mixing, solving a coverage problem where direct turbulence measurements are absent but CTD profiles are available. This method can offer significant value, but there are limitations in its broad application to the global ocean. FSP often fails to produce reliable results in frontal zones where temperature–salinity (T/S) intrusive features contaminate the CTD strain spectrum, as well as where the aspect ratio of the internal wave spectrum is known to vary greatly with depth, as frequently occurs in the Southern Ocean. In this study we use direct turbulence measurements from Diapycnal and Isopycnal Mixing Experiment in the Southern Ocean (DIMES) and glider microstructure measurements from Autonomous Sampling of Southern Ocean Mixing (AUSSOM) to show that FSP can have large biases (compared to direct turbulence measurement) below the mixed layer when physics associated with T/S fronts are meaningfully present. We propose that the FSP methodology be modified to 1) include a density ratio (Rρ)-based data exclusion rule to avoid contamination by double diffusive instabilities in frontal zones such as the Antarctic Circumpolar Current, the Gulf Stream, and the Kuroshio, and 2) conduct (or leverage available) microstructure measurements of the depth-varying shear-to-strain ratio Rω(z) prior to performing FSP in each dynamically unique region of the global ocean. Significance Statement: Internal waves travel through the ocean and collide, turbulently mixing the interior ocean and homogenizing its waters. In the absence of actual turbulence measurements, oceanographers count the ripples associated with these internal waves and use them estimate the amount of turbulence that will transpire from their collisions. In this paper we show that the ripples in temperature and salinity that naturally occur at sharp fronts masquerade as internal waves and trick oceanographers into thinking there is up to 100 000 000 times more turbulence than there actually is in these frontal regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The global dissipation caused by bottom boundary layer drag is one of the major pathways for the consumption of kinetic energy in the deep ocean. However, the spatial distribution and global integral of the drag dissipation are still debatable. This paper presents an updated estimate of the dissipation rate, using the barotropic component of surface geostrophic currents and 632 in situ velocity measurements. Also, the seafloor roughness is proposed as a parameter of drag efficiency in the parameterized method. The results provide a map of the drag dissipation rate with a global integral of ~0.26 TW. Approximately 66% of this dissipation occurs in the Southern Ocean, which is consistent with the proportion of wind power input into this region. Building upon the work in previous studies on the bottom boundary layer drag, more long-period observations are used, eliminating the influence of the baroclinic contribution to the surface geostrophic currents in the construction of the bottom velocity, and taking topographic roughness into account. The estimates have implications for the maintenance of density structure in the deep ocean and understanding of the kinetic energy budget. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Raco is a local wind occurring in central Chile where the Maipo River Canyon exits into the Santiago valley. The intensification of the easterly down-canyon flow starts at any time during some cold season nights, accompanied by increases in temperature and drops in humidity. The hypothesis of the raco being a gap wind controlled by the narrowest section in the 12-km canyon exit corridor is tested with data from two events in July 2018 and July 2019. The data are analyzed in the framework of hydraulic theory, and a subcritical-to-supercritical transition is documented to occur at the narrows of the gap where the Froude number is close to unity, confirmed by radiosondes launched in the narrows in 2019. For the raco flow, the sum of potential and kinetic energy is conserved upstream of the narrows, while the acceleration occurring farther downstream loses a large fraction of energy to frictional dissipation. The raco events occur under the influence of regional subsidence, but a differential nocturnal warming of the in-canyon air mass is responsible for a pressure gradient driving the raco. In the 2019 case, a ceilometer mounted on an instrumented pickup truck documented the structure and movement of the interface between the raco air and the cold-air pool (CAP) existing over the valley to the west. Together with a radiosonde launched near the CAP–raco surface front, the observations reveal the intense shear-driven mixing taking place at the interface and the factors supporting the establishment of a stationary front. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Wave breaking removes energy from the surface wave field and injects it into the upper ocean, where it is dissipated by viscosity. This paper presents an investigation of turbulent kinetic energy (TKE) dissipation beneath breaking waves. Wind, wave, and turbulence data were collected in the North Pacific Ocean aboard R/P FLIP, during the ONR-sponsored High Resolution Air-Sea Interaction (HiRes) and Radiance in a Dynamic Ocean (RaDyO) experiments. A new method for measuring TKE dissipation at the sea surface was combined with subsurface measurements to allow estimation of TKE dissipation over the entire wave-affected surface layer. Near the surface, dissipation decayed with depth as z−1, and below approximately one significant wave height, it decayed more quickly, approaching z−2. High levels of TKE dissipation very near the sea surface were consistent with the large fraction of wave energy dissipation attributed to non-air-entraining microbreakers. Comparison of measured profiles with large-eddy simulation results in the literature suggests that dissipation is concentrated closer to the surface than previously expected, largely because the simulations did not resolve microbreaking. Total integrated dissipation in the water column agreed well with dissipation by breaking for young waves, (where c m is the mean wave frequency and is the atmospheric friction velocity), implying that breaking was the dominant source of turbulence in those conditions. The results of these extensive measurements of near-surface dissipation over three field experiments are discussed in the context of observations and ocean boundary layer modeling efforts by other groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents an estimate of the oceanic Lorenz energy cycle derived from a simulation forced by 6-hourly fluxes obtained from NCEP-NCAR reanalysis-1. The total rate of energy generation amounts to 6.6 TW, of which 1.9 TW is generated by the time-mean winds and 2.2 TW by the time-varying winds. The dissipation of kinetic energy amounts to 4.4 TW, of which 3 TW originate from the dissipation of eddy kinetic energy. The energy exchange between reservoirs is dominated by the baroclinic pathway and the pathway that distributes the energy generated by the time-mean winds. The former converts 0.7 to 0.8 TW mean available potential energy to eddy available potential energy and finally to eddy kinetic energy, whereas the latter converts 0.5 TW mean kinetic energy to mean available potential energy. This energy cycle differs from the atmospheric one in two aspects. First, the generation of the mean kinetic and mean available potential energy is each, to a first approximation, balanced by the dissipation. The interaction of the oceanic general circulation with mesoscale eddies is hence less crucial than the corresponding interaction in the atmosphere. Second, the baroclinic pathway in the ocean is facilitated not only by the surface buoyancy flux but also by the winds through a conversion of 0.5 TW mean kinetic energy to mean available potential energy. In the atmosphere, the respective conversion is almost absent and the baroclinic energy pathway is driven solely by the differential heating. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The atmospheric kinetic energy spectrum and energy cascade are investigated in idealized simulations of radiative–convective equilibrium (RCE). WRF is employed to perform cloud-resolving simulations of an idealized radiative–convective equilibrium with and without aggregation with Δx = 4 km. The horizontal kinetic energy (HKE) spectrum for the aggregated simulation in the upper troposphere is steeper than the nonaggregated case and closer to −5/3. The HKE spectra for the nonaggregated simulation in the upper troposphere and the lower stratosphere are much shallower than the −5/3 spectrum. In the upper troposphere, the divergent kinetic energy has a similar magnitude to the rotational kinetic energy in both the nonaggregated simulation and aggregated simulation. Energy is mainly gained from the buoyancy flux and mainly lost from the vertical energy flux for scales larger than 20 km. Downscale energy transfer is found in the upper troposphere. Numerical dissipation is the main source of energy loss at small scales. In the lower stratosphere, the divergent kinetic energy dominates the kinetic energy spectrum in both simulations. Energy is mainly gained from the vertical energy flux and is balanced by the loss from the buoyancy flux term, transfer term, and dissipation. An Eliassen–Palm flux analysis suggests that wave–mean-flow interaction may be responsible for the upscale energy transfer found in the lower stratosphere. The magnitudes of our kinetic energy spectra are similar to spectra calculated from aircraft data. Rotation is found to promote aggregation and steepen the energy spectrum. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Gulf Stream (GS) is one of the strongest ocean currents on the planet. Eddy-rich resolution models are needed to properly represent the dynamics of the GS; however, kinetic energy (KE) can be in excess in these models if not dissipated efficiently. The question of how and how much energy is dissipated and in particular how it flows through ocean scales thus remains an important and largely unanswered question. Using a high-resolution (∼2 km) ocean model [Coastal and Regional Ocean Community (CROCO)], we characterize the spatial and temporal distribution of turbulent cascades in the GS based on a coarse-grained method. We show that the balanced flow is associated with an inverse cascade while the forward cascade is explained by ageostrophic advection associated with frontogenesis. Downscale fluxes are dominant at scales smaller than about 20 km near the surface and most intense at the GS North Wall. There is also strong seasonal variability in KE flux, with the forward cascade intensifying in winter and the inverse cascade later in spring. The forward cascade, which represents an interior route to dissipation, is compared with both numerical and boundary dissipation processes. The contribution of interior dissipation is an order of magnitude smaller than that of the other energy sinks. We thus evaluate the sensitivity of horizontal momentum advection schemes on energy dissipation and show that the decrease in numerical dissipation in a high-order scheme leads to an increase in dissipation at the boundaries, not in the downscale flux. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cold pools can initiate new convection by increasing vertical velocity (mechanical forcing) and locally enhancing moisture content (thermodynamic forcing). This study investigates the impact of the environment on mechanical and thermodynamic forcing from cold pool collisions. An ensemble of high-resolution numerical simulations was conducted that tested the sensitivity of cold pool collisions to three parameters: 1) the initial temperature deficit of cold pools, 2) the initial distance between cold pools, and 3) the static stability and moisture content of the environment. These parameters are tested in the absence of condensation, surface fluxes, radiation, and wind shear. Colder initial cold pools increase mechanical and thermodynamic forcing owing to greater horizontal winds during collisions. For all environments tested, mechanical forcing peaked robustly at an optimal initial distance between the cold pools due to a balance between the creation and dissipation of kinetic energy, and the different phases of density current evolution. Thermodynamic forcing peaked for greater initial cold pool distances than those associated with mechanical forcing. Decreased low-level static stability and an increased vertical gradient in low-level moisture enhanced mechanical and thermodynamic forcing, respectively. It is also shown that the initial temperature deficit had the greatest impact on mechanical and thermodynamic forcing, followed by the environment, and finally the initial separation distance. Finally, cold pool collisions are classified as "mechanically strong" or "mechanically weak," where mechanically strong collisions increased mechanical forcing beyond that driven by the initial outward spreading of the cold pools. An analogous classification of "thermodynamically strong/weak" is also presented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To calculate a turbulent kinetic energy dissipation rate from the microstructure vertical shear of the horizontal velocity via a spectral analysis, shear spectra need first to be cleaned from vibrations of the moving vehicle. Unambiguously, this study shows that the spectral cleaning must be applied all over the frequency range and not only at frequencies larger than 10 Hz, as a recent study suggested. For a Vertical Microstructure Profiler (VMP-6000), not correcting for vehicle vibrations below 10 Hz leads to overestimated dissipation rates from 50% to 700% for usual downcast velocities and for weak dissipation rates (ε < 1 × 10−9 W kg−1). Vibrations concern all vehicles, but the exact vibrational frequency signature depends on the vehicle shape and its downcast velocity. In any case, a spectral cleaning over the whole frequency range is strongly advised. This study also reports on a systematic low bias of inferred dissipation rates induced by the spectral cleaning when too few degrees of freedom are available for the cleaning, which is usually the default of the standard processing. Whatever the dissipation rate level, not correcting for the bias leads to underestimated dissipation rates by a factor 1.4–2.7 (with usual parameters), the exact amplitude of the bias depending on the number of degrees of freedom and on the number of independent accelerometer axes used for the cleaning. It is strongly advised that such a bias be taken into account to recompute dissipation rates of past datasets and for future observations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Following our previous investigation of the turbulence impact on cloud-base single-size CCN activation, this study considers a similar problem assuming CCN size distribution obtained from field measurements. The total CNN concentration is taken as either 200 cm−3 to represent clean conditions, or as 2000 cm−3 to represent polluted conditions. CCN is assumed to be sodium chloride. The CCN activation in the rising nonturbulent adiabatic parcel is contrasted with the activation within a rising adiabatic parcel filled with inertial-range homogeneous isotropic turbulence. The turbulent parcel of 643 m3 and the turbulent kinetic energy dissipation rate of 10−3 m−2 s−3 are used in most of the simulations. Results for a range of mean parcel ascent rates, between 0.125 and 8 m s−1, are discussed. Overall, the adiabatic turbulent parcel simulations show results consistent with the adiabatic nonturbulent parcel, with higher activated CCN concentrations for stronger parcel ascent rates. The key difference is a blurriness of the separation between dry CCN size bins featuring activated and nonactivated (haze) CCN, especially for weak mean ascent rates. The blurriness comes from CCN getting activated and subsequently deactivated in the fluctuating supersaturation field, instead of all becoming cloud droplets above the cloud base. This leads to significantly larger spectral widths in turbulent parcel simulations compared to the nonturbulent parcel when activation is completed. Modeling results are discussed in the context of the impact of turbulent fluctuations on CCN activation documented in laboratory experiments using the Pi chamber. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Diffusive theories for the meridional atmospheric energy transport can summarize our understanding of this central aspect of the general circulation. They can also be utilized in simple models of Earth's energy balance to help interpret the response of the system to perturbations. A theory for this diffusivity of eddy heat transport is described based on Rhines scaling and the global entropy budget, each of which provides a constraint between the kinetic energy dissipation and the diffusivity. An expression for the diffusivity is then obtained by eliminating the dissipation from this set of two constraints. The theory can be thought of as a generalization of the theories of Held–Larichev and Barry–Craig–Thuburn. The theory is compared to simulations of the Held–Suarez idealized dry atmospheric model. Limitations of the theory are emphasized. The form of the theory allows it to be readily generalized to a moist atmosphere. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Approximations of the turbulent moments of the atmospheric convective boundary layer are constructed based on a variant of the local similarity theory. As the basic parameters of this theory, the second moment of vertical velocity and the "spectral" Prandtl mixing length are used. This specific choice of the basic parameters allows us to consider the coefficient of turbulent transfer and the dissipation of kinetic energy of the Prandtl turbulence theory as the forms of the local similarity. Therefore, the obtained approximations of the turbulent moments should be considered as natural complementation to the semiempirical turbulence theory. Moreover, within the atmospheric surface layer, the approximations of the new local similarity theory are identical to the relations of the Monin–Obukhov similarity theory (MOST). Therefore, the proposed approximations should be considered as a direct generalization of the MOST under free-convection conditions. The new approximations are compared with the relations of the known local similarity theories. The advantages and limitations of the new theory are discussed. The comparison of the approximations of the new local similarity theory with the field and laboratory experimental data indicates the high effectiveness of the proposed approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Linear theory for steady stratified flow over topography sets the range for topographic wavenumbers over which freely propagating internal waves are generated, and the radiation and breaking of these waves contribute to energy dissipation away from the ocean bottom. However, previous numerical work demonstrated that dissipation rates can be enhanced by flow over large-scale topographies with wavenumbers outside of the lee wave radiative range. We conduct idealized 3D numerical simulations of steady stratified flow over 1D topography in a rotating domain and quantify vertical distribution of kinetic energy dissipation. We vary two parameters: the first determines whether the topographic obstacle is within the lee wave radiative range and the second, proportional to the topographic height, measures the degree of flow nonlinearity. For certain combinations of topographic width and height, breaking occurs in pulses every inertial period, such that kinetic energy dissipation develops inertial periodicity. In these simulations, kinetic energy dissipation rates are also enhanced in the interior of the domain. In the radiative regime the inertial motions arise due to resonant wave–wave interactions. In the small wavenumber nonradiative regime, instabilities downstream of the obstacle can facilitate the generation and propagation of nonlinearly forced inertial motions, especially as topographic height increase. In our simulations, dissipation rates for tall and wide nonradiative topography are comparable to those of radiative topography, even away from the bottom, which is relevant to the ocean where the topographic spectrum is such that wider abyssal hills also tend to be taller. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on daily data from the Japanese 55-year Reanalysis (JRA-55) covering the spring seasons from 1958 to 2018, this study examines the formation mechanisms and climate impacts of the springtime western Pacific (WP) pattern as subseasonal climate variability over North Pacific. Results suggest that the springtime WP pattern arises from a weak dipole-like disturbance over North Pacific and disturbances over East Asia. The energetic analysis suggests that the baroclinic energy conversion acts as an important energy source to balance the available potential energy loss caused by transient eddies and diabatic heating and acts as a kinetic energy (KE) source for the WP pattern. For the feedback forcing by total transient eddies, it acts as a major KE source for the WP pattern before day 0 and acts as a strong KE sink after day 0. It turns out that the barotropic energy conversion makes only weak KE contribution to the WP pattern. Once the WP pattern forms, East Asia and North America experience strong surface air temperature anomalies of opposite signs, while strong sea surface temperature anomalies are found to occur over midlatitude and tropical North Pacific at the same time. Concurrently, the Pacific jet and the storm track shift northward or southward around their climatological position. In addition, a dipole-like shallow convective anomaly appears over midlatitude North Pacific, and a band of anomalous deep convection tends to occur in the tropics as the energy of the WP pattern propagates into the region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Water-mass transformation by turbulent mixing is a key part of the deep-ocean overturning, as it drives the upwelling of dense waters formed at high latitudes. Here, we quantify this transformation and its underpinning processes in a small Southern Ocean basin: the Orkney Deep. Observations reveal a focusing of the transport in density space as a deep western boundary current (DWBC) flows through the region, associated with lightening and densification of the current's denser and lighter layers, respectively. These transformations are driven by vigorous turbulent mixing. Comparing this transformation with measurements of the rate of turbulent kinetic energy dissipation indicates that, within the DWBC, turbulence operates with a high mixing efficiency, characterized by a dissipation ratio of 0.6 to 1 that exceeds the common value of 0.2. This result is corroborated by estimates of the dissipation ratio from microstructure observations. The causes of the transformation are unraveled through a decomposition into contributions dependent on the gradients in density space of the: dianeutral mixing rate, isoneutral area, and stratification. The transformation is found to be primarily driven by strong turbulence acting on an abrupt transition from the weakly stratified bottom boundary layer to well-stratified off-boundary waters. The reduced boundary layer stratification is generated by a downslope Ekman flow associated with the DWBC's flow along sloping topography, and is further regulated by submesoscale instabilities acting to restratify near-boundary waters. Our results provide observational evidence endorsing the importance of near-boundary mixing processes to deep-ocean overturning, and highlight the role of DWBCs as hot spots of dianeutral upwelling. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Short-range infrared (IR) observations of ocean surface reveal complicated spatially varying and evolving structures. Here we present an approach to use spatially correlated time series IR images, over a time scale of one-tenth of a second, of the water surface to derive underlying surface velocity and turbulence fields. The approach here was tested in a laboratory using grid-generated turbulence and a heater assembly. The technique was compared with in situ measurements to validate our IR-derived remotemeasurements. The IR-measured turbulent kinetic energy (TKE) dissipation rateswere consistent with in situ--measured dissipation using a vertical microstructure profiler (VMP). We used measurements of the gradient of the velocity field to calculate TKE dissipation rates at the surface. Based on theoretical and experimental considerations, we have proposed two models of IR TKE dissipation rate retrievals and designed an approach for oceanic field IR applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Turbulent mixing adjacent to the Velasco Reef and Kyushu-Palau Ridge, off northern Palau in the western equatorial Pacific Ocean, is examined using shipboard and moored observations. The study focuses on a 9-day-long, ship-based microstructure and velocity survey, conducted in November-December 2016. Several sections (9-15 km in length) of microstructure, hydrographic, and velocity fields were acquired over and around the reef, where water depths ranged from 50 to 3000 m. Microstructure profiles were collected while steaming slowly either toward or away from the reef, and underway current surveys were conducted along quasi-rectangular boxes with side lengths of 5-10 km. Near the reef, both tidal and subtidal motions were important, while subtidal motions were stronger away from the reef. Vertical shears of currents and mixing were stronger on the northern and eastern flanks of the reef than on the western flanks. High turbulent kinetic energy dissipation rates, 10-6-10-4W kg-1, and large values of eddy diffusivities, 10-4-10-2m² s-1, with strong turbulent heat fluxes, 100-500W m-2, were found. Currents flowing along the eastern side separated at the northern tip of the reef and generated submesoscale cyclonic vorticity of about 2-4 times the planetary vorticity. The analysis suggests that a torque, imparted by the turbulent bottom stress, generated the cyclonic vorticity at the northern boundary. The northern reef is associated with high vertical transports resulting from both submesoscale flow convergences and energetic mixing. Even though the area around Palau represents a small footprint of the ocean, vertical velocities and mixing rates are several orders magnitude larger than in the open ocean. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Some high-resolution CTD data collected in the spring of 2017 are analyzed using Thorpe sorting and scale analyses, including both the commonly used "Thorpe scale" method and a lesser-used method that is based on directly estimating the "available overturn potential energy" (AOPE): the difference between potential energies of the raw versus sorted density profiles in a mixing "turbulent patch." The speed of the profiler varied, so the spatial (vertical) sampling is uneven. A method is developed and described to apply the Thorpe scaling and the AOPE approaches to such unevenly sampled data. The AOPE approach appears to be less sensitive to the (poorly constrained) estimate of the "background" buoyancy frequency N. Although these approaches are typically used to first estimate the dissipation rate εK of turbulent kinetic energy, the real goal is to estimate the diffusivity of density Kρ and hence the net alteration of the density profile by mixing. Two easily measured dimensionless parameters are presented as possible metrics of the "age" or "state" of the mixing patch, which might help to resolve the question of how the total turbulent energy and dissipation are apportioned between kinetic and potential components and hence how much of the measured AOPE ends up changing the background stratification. A speculative example as to how this might work is presented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this work, direct numerical simulation (DNS) of the stratocumulus cloud-top mixing layer is used to test various approaches to estimate the turbulence kinetic energy (TKE) dissipation rate ε from one-dimensional (1D) intersections that resemble experimental series. Results of these estimates are compared with "true" (DNS) values of ε in buoyant and inhomogeneous atmospheric flows. We focus on recently proposed methods of the TKE dissipation-rate retrievals based on zero crossings and recovering the missing part of the spectrum. These methods are tested on fully resolved turbulence fields and compared to standard retrievals from power spectra and structure functions. Anisotropy of turbulence due to buoyancy is shown to influence retrievals based on the vertical velocity component. TKE dissipation-rate estimates from the number of crossings correspond well to spectral estimates. The method based on the recovery of the missing part of the spectrum works best for Pope's model of the dissipation spectrum and is sensitive to external intermittency. This allows for characterization of external intermittency by the Taylor-to-Liepmann scale ratio. Further improvements of this method are possible when the variance of the velocity derivative is used instead of the number of zero crossings per unit length. In conclusion, the new methods of TKE dissipation-rate retrieval from 1D series provide a valuable complement to standard approaches. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We aim to diagnose internal gravity waves emitted from balanced flow and investigate their role in the downscale transfer of energy. We use an idealized numerical model to simulate a range of baroclinically unstable flows to mimic dynamical regimes ranging from ageostrophic to quasigeostrophic flows. Wavelike signals present in the simulated flows, seen for instance in the vertical velocity, can be related to gravity wave activity identified by frequency and frequency-wavenumber spectra. To explicitly assign the energy contributions to the balanced and unbalanced (gravity) modes, we perform linear and nonlinear modal decomposition to decompose the full state variable into its balanced and unbalanced counterparts. The linear decomposition shows a reasonable separation of the slow and fast modes but is no longer valid when applied to a nonlinear system. To account for the nonlinearity in our system, we apply the normal mode initialization technique proposed by Machenhauer in 1977. Further, we assess the strength of the gravity wave activity and dissipation related to the decomposed modes for different dynamical regimes. We find that gravity wave emission becomes increasingly stronger going from quasigeostrophic to ageostrophic regime. The kinetic energy tied to the unbalanced mode scales close to Ro2 (or Ri-1), with Ro and Ri being the Rossby and Richardson numbers, respectively. Furthermore, internal gravity waves dissipate predominantly through small-scale dissipation, which emphasizes their role in the downscale energy transfer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ocean microstructure, current, and hydrography observations from June 2016 are used to characterize the turbulence structure of the Lofoten Basin eddy (LBE), a long-lived anticyclone in the Norwegian Sea. The LBE had an azimuthal peak velocity of 0.8 m s−1 at 950-m depth and 22-km radial distance from its center and a core relative vorticity reaching −0.7f (f is the local Coriolis parameter). When contrasted to a reference station in a relatively quiescent part of the basin, the LBE was significantly turbulent between 750 and 2000 m, exceeding the dissipation rates ε in the reference station by up to two orders of magnitude. Dissipation rates were elevated particularly in the core and at the rim below the swirl velocity maximum, reaching 10−8 W kg−1. The sources of energy for the observed turbulence are the background shear (gradient Richardson number less than unity) and the subinertial energy trapped by the negative vorticity of the eddy. Idealized ray-tracing calculations show that the vertical and lateral changes in stratification, shear, and vorticity allow subinertial waves to be trapped within the LBE. Spectral analysis shows increased high-wavenumber clockwise-polarized shear variance in the core and rim regions, consistent with downward-propagating near-inertial waves (vertical wavelengths of order 100 m and energy levels 3 to 10 times the canonical open-ocean level). The energetic packets with a distinct downward energy propagation are typically accompanied with an increase in dissipation levels. Based on these summer observations, the time scale to drain the volume-integrated total energy of the LBE is 14 years. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Observations of turbulent kinetic energy, dissipation, and turbulent stress were collected in the middle reaches of Chesapeake Bay and were used to assess second-moment closure predictions of turbulence generated beneath breaking waves. Dissipation scaling indicates that the turbulent flow structure observed during a 10-day wind event was dominated by a three-layer response that consisted of 1) a wave transport layer, 2) a surface log layer, and 3) a tidal, bottom boundary layer limited by stable stratification. Below the wave transport layer, turbulent mixing was limited by stable stratification. Within the wave transport layer, where dissipation was balanced by a divergence in the vertical turbulent kinetic energy flux, the eddy viscosity was significantly underestimated by second-moment turbulence closure models, suggesting that breaking waves homogenized the mixed surface layer to a greater extent than the simple model of TKE diffusing away from a source at the surface. While the turbulent transport of TKE occurred largely downgradient, the intermittent downward sweeps of momentum generated by breaking waves occurred largely independent of the mean shear. The underprediction of stress in the wave transport layer by second-moment closures was likely due to the inability of the eddy viscosity model to capture the nonlocal turbulent transport of the momentum flux beneath breaking waves. Finally, the authors hypothesize that large-scale coherent turbulent eddies played a significant role in transporting momentum generated near the surface to depth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The combination of acoustic Doppler current profilers and the structure function methodology provides an attractive approach to making extended time series measurements of oceanic turbulence (the rate of turbulent kinetic energy dissipation ε) from moorings. However, this study shows that for deployments in the upper part of the water column, estimates of ε will be biased by the vertical gradient in wave orbital velocities. To remove this bias, a modified structure function methodology is developed that exploits the differing length scale dependencies of the contributions to the structure function resulting from turbulent and wave orbital motions. The success of the modified method is demonstrated through a comparison of ε estimates based on data from instruments at three depths over a 3-month period under a wide range of conditions, with appropriate scalings for wind stress and convective forcing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Wave-induced turbulence due to breaking in the absence of surface shear stresses is investigated experimentally. A high-fidelity particle image velocimetry (PIV) technique is used to measure the turbulence near the water surface, inside the wave crests. The spatial velocity vector fields of the breaking waves acquired from PIV provide accurate vertical velocity profiles near the air-water interface, as well as wavenumber velocity spectra beneath the breaking waves at different depths. These velocity spectra exhibit a Kolmogorov interval at high wavenumbers, indicating the presence of isotropic turbulence and permitting an estimation of energy dissipation rates. The depth dependence of dissipation rates of the breaking waves generated in the laboratory shows a scaling similar to that found in wind-forced breaking waves in the field. A phase dependence in the dissipation rates of turbulence kinetic energy is also observed, which should be considered to improve the accuracy of the estimated and modeled wave energy dissipation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Lee waves are thought to play a prominent role in Southern Ocean dynamics, facilitating a transfer of energy from the jets of the Antarctic Circumpolar Current to microscale, turbulent motions important in water mass transformations. Two EM-APEX profiling floats deployed in the Drake Passage during the Diapycnal and Isopycnal Mixing Experiment (DIMES) independently measured a 120 ± 20-m vertical amplitude lee wave over the Shackleton Fracture Zone. A model for steady EM-APEX motion is developed to calculate absolute vertical water velocity, augmenting the horizontal velocity measurements made by the floats. The wave exhibits fluctuations in all three velocity components of over 15 cms-1 and an intrinsic frequency close to the local buoyancy frequency. The wave is observed to transport energy and horizontal momentum vertically at respective peak rates of 1.3 ± 0.2Wm2 and 8 ± 1Nm-2. The rate of turbulent kinetic energy dissipation is estimated using both Thorpe scales and a method that isolates high-frequency vertical kinetic energy and is found to be enhanced within the wave to values of order 10-7Wkg-1. The observed vertical flux of energy is significantly larger than expected fromidealized numerical simulations and also larger than observed depth-integrated dissipation rates. These results provide the first unambiguous observation of a lee wave in the Southern Ocean with simultaneous measurements of its energetics and dynamics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The effects of internal waves (IWs), externally forced by high-frequency wind, on energy pathways are studied in submesoscale-resolving numerical simulations of an idealized wind-driven channel flow. Two processes are examined: the direct extraction of mesoscale energy by externally forced IWs followed by an IW forward energy cascade to dissipation and stimulated imbalance, a mechanism through which externally forced IWs trigger a forward mesoscale to submesoscale energy cascade to dissipation. This study finds that the frequency and wavenumber spectral slopes are shallower in solutions with high-frequency forcing compared to solutions without and that the volume-averaged interior kinetic energy dissipation rate increases tenfold. The ratio between the enhanced dissipation rate and the added high-frequency wind work is 1.3, demonstrating the significance of the IW-mediated forward cascades. Temporal-scale analysis of energy exchanges among low- (mesoscale), intermediate- (submesoscale), and high-frequency (IW) bands shows a corresponding increase in kinetic energy Ek and available potential energy APE transfers from mesoscales to submesoscales (stimulated imbalance) and mesoscales to IWs (direct extraction). Two direct extraction routes are identified: a mesoscale to IW Ek transfer and a mesoscale to IW APE transfer followed by an IW APE to IW Ek conversion. Spatial-scale analysis of eddy-IW interaction in solutions with high-frequency forcing shows an equivalent increase in forward Ek and APE transfers inside both anticyclones and cyclones. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For measurements from either profiling or moored instruments, several processing techniques exist to estimate the dissipation rate of turbulent kinetic energy ϵ, a core quantity used to determine oceanic mixing rates. Moored velocimeters can provide long-term measurements of ϵ, but they can be plagued by motion-induced contamination. To remove this contamination, two methodologies are presented that use independent measurements of the instrument's acceleration and rotation in space. The first is derived from the relationship between the spectra (cospectra) and the variance (covariance) of a time series. The cospectral technique recovers the environmental (or true) velocity spectrum by summing the measured spectrum, the motion-induced spectrum, and the cospectrum between the motion-induced and measured velocities. The second technique recovers the environmental spectrum by correcting the measured spectrum with the squared coherency, essentially assuming that the measured signal shares variance with either the environmental signal or the motion signal. Both techniques are applied to moored velocimeters at 7.5 and 20.5 m above the seabed in 105 m of water. By estimating the orbital velocities from their respective spectra and comparing them against those obtained from nearby wave measurements, the study shows that the surface wave signature is recovered with the cospectral technique, while it is underpredicted with the squared coherency technique. The latter technique is particularly problematic when the instrument's motion is in phase with the orbital (environmental) velocities, as it removes variance that should have been added to the measured spectrum. The estimated ϵ from the cospectral technique compares well with estimates from nearby microstructure velocity shear vertical profiles. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Stratification in the Southern Ocean is determined primarily by a competition between westerly wind-driven upwelling and baroclinic eddy transport. This study investigates the time scales of equilibration of the Southern Ocean in response to changing winds through an idealized channel model. An analytical framework describing the energetic pathways between wind input, available potential energy (APE), eddy kinetic energy (EKE), and dissipation provides a simple theory of the phase and amplitude response to oscillating wind stress. The transient ocean response to variable winds lies between the two limits of Ekman response (high frequency), characterized by the isopycnal slope responding directly to wind stress, and 'eddy saturation' (low frequency), wherein a large fraction of the anomalous wind work goes into mesoscale eddies. The crossover time scale is the time scale of meridional eddy diffusive transport across the Antarctic Circumpolar Current (ACC) front. For wind variability with a period of 3 months (high-frequency forcing), the relative conversion of wind work to APE/EKE is 11, while for a period of 16 years (low-frequency forcing), the relative conversion to APE/EKE reduces to 3. The system's frequency response is characterized by a complex transfer function. Both the phase and amplitude response of EKE and APE predicted by the linear analytic framework are verified using multiple ensemble experiments in an eddy-resolving (4-km horizontal resolution) isopycnal coordinate model. The results from the numerical experiments show agreement with the linear theory and can be used to explain certain features observed in previous modeling studies and observations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The variability of the turbulent kinetic energy dissipation due to internal waves is quantified using a finescale parameterization applied to the A25 Greenland-Portugal transect repeated every two years from 2002 to 2012. The internal wave velocity shear and strain are estimated for each cruise at 91 stations from full depth vertical profiles of density and velocity. The 2002-12 averaged dissipation rate 〈 ε2002-2012〉 in the upper ocean lays in the range 1-10 × 10−10 W kg−1. At depth, 〈 ε2002-2012〉 is smaller than 1 × 10−10 W kg−1 except over rough topography found at the continental slopes, the Reykjanes Ridge, and in a region delimited by the Azores-Biscay Rise and Eriador Seamount. There, the vertical energy flux of internal waves is preferentially oriented toward the surface and 〈 ε2002-2012〉 is in the range 1-20 × 10−10 W kg−1. The interannual variability in the dissipation rates is remarkably small over the whole transect. A few strong dissipation rate events exceeding the uncertainty of the finescale parameterization occur at depth between the Azores-Biscay Rise and Eriador Seamount. This region is also marked by mesoscale eddying flows resulting in enhanced surface energy level and enhanced bottom velocities. Estimates of the vertical energy fluxes into the internal tide and into topographic internal waves suggest that the latter are responsible for the strong dissipation events. At Eriador Seamount, both topographic internal waves and the internal tide contribute with the same order of magnitude to the dissipation rate while around the Reykjanes Ridge the internal tide provides the bulk of the dissipation rate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The ability to estimate the rate of dissipation ( ε) of turbulent kinetic energy at middepth in a high-speed tidal channel using broadband acoustic Doppler current profilers (ADCPs) is assessed by making comparisons to direct measurements of ε obtained using shear probes mounted on a streamlined underwater buoy. The investigation was carried out in Grand Passage, Nova Scotia, Canada, where the depth-averaged flow speed reached 2 m s−1 and the Reynolds number was 8 × 107. The speed bin-averaged dissipation rates estimated from the ADCP data agree with the shear probe data to within a factor of 2. Both the ADCP and the shear probe measurements indicate a linear dependence of ε on the cube of the flow speed during flood and much lower dissipation rates during ebb. The ebb-flood asymmetry and the small-scale intermittency in ε are also apparent in the lognormal distributions of the shear probe data. Possible sources of bias and error in the ε estimates are investigated, and the most likely causes of the discrepancy between the ADCP and shear probe estimates are the cross-channel separation of the instruments and the high degree of spatial variability that exists in the channel. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using primitive equation simulations, a zonally periodic channel is considered. The channel flow is forced by a combination of steady and high-frequency winds. The high-frequency forcing excites near-inertial motion, and the focus is on how this influences the low-frequency, nearly geostrophic part of the flow. In particular, this study seeks to clarify how Reynolds stresses exerted by the near-inertial modes affect the low-frequency kinetic energy. In the system considered, the near-inertial Reynolds stresses (i) serve as a sink term in the low-frequency kinetic energy budget and (ii) transfer low-frequency kinetic energy downward from the mixed layer. Transfer spectra show the bulk of this sink to occur at relatively small horizontal wavenumber (i.e., in the mesoscale, not the submesoscale). The presence of near-inertial motion can also affect the kinetic-to-potential energy exchanges, especially within the low-frequency band. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

By taking into account the contributions of both locally and remotely generated internal tides, the tidal mixing in the Luzon Strait (LS) and the South China Sea (SCS) is investigated through internal-tide simulation and energetics analysis. A three-dimensional nonhydrostatic high-resolution model driven by four primary tidal constituents (M2, S2, K1, and O1) is used for the internal-tide simulation. The baroclinic energy budget analysis reveals that the internal tides radiated from the LS are the dominant energy source for the tidal dissipation in the SCS. In the LS, the estimated depth-integrated turbulent kinetic energy dissipation exceeds O(1) W m−2 atop the two subsurface ridges, with a dissipation rate of > O(10−7) W kg−1 and diapycnal diffusivity of ~ O(10−2) m2 s−1. In the SCS, the most intense turbulence occurs in the deep-water basin with a dissipation rate of O(10−8-10−6) W kg−1 and diapycnal diffusivity of O(10−3-10−1) m2 s−1 within the ~2000-m water column above the seafloor as well as in the shelfbreak region with a dissipation rate of O(10−7-10−6) W kg−1 and diapycnal diffusivity of O(10−4-10−3) m2 s−1. These estimated values are consistent with observations reported in previous studies and are at least one order of magnitude larger than those based solely on locally generated internal tides. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Wave breaking is thought to be the dominant mechanism for energy loss by the surface wave field. Breaking results in energetic and highly turbulent velocity fields, concentrated within approximately one wave height of the surface. To make meaningful estimates of wave energy dissipation in the upper ocean, it is then necessary to make accurate measurements of turbulent kinetic energy (TKE) dissipation very near the surface. However, the surface wave field makes measurements of turbulence at the air-sea interface challenging since the energy spectrum contains energy from both waves and turbulence over the same range of wavenumbers and frequencies. Furthermore, wave orbital velocities can advect the turbulent wake of instrumentation into the sampling volume of the instrument. In this work a new technique for measuring TKE dissipation at the sea surface that overcomes these difficulties is presented. Using a stereo pair of longwave infrared cameras, it is possible to reconstruct the surface displacement and velocity fields. The vorticity of that velocity field can then be considered to be representative of the rotational turbulence and not the irrotational wave orbital velocities. The turbulent kinetic energy dissipation rate can then be calculated by comparing the vorticity spectrum to a universal spectrum. Average surface TKE dissipation calculated in this manner was found to be consistent with near-surface values from the literature, and time-dependent dissipation was found to depend on breaking. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Turbulent microstructure and acoustic Doppler current profiler (ADCP) data were collected near Tacoma Narrows in Puget Sound, Washington. Over 100 coincident microstructure profiles have been compared to ADCP estimates of turbulent kinetic energy dissipation rate ( ϵ). ADCP dissipation rates were calculated using the large-eddy method with theoretically determined corrections for sensor noise on rms velocity and integral-scale calculations. This work is an extension of Ann Gargett's approach, which used a narrowband ADCP in regions with intense turbulence and strong vertical velocities. Here, a broadband ADCP is used to measure weaker turbulence and achieve greater horizontal and vertical resolution relative to the narrowband ADCP. Estimates of ϵ from the Modular Microstructure Profiler (MMP) and broadband ADCP show good quantitative agreement over nearly three decades of dissipation rate, 3 × 10−8-10−5 m2 s−3. This technique is most readily applied when the turbulent velocity is greater than the ADCP velocity uncertainty ( σ) and the ADCP cell size is within a factor of 2 of the Thorpe scale. The 600-kHz broadband ADCP used in this experiment yielded a noise floor of 3 mm s−1 for 3-m vertical bins and 2-m along-track average (≈four pings), which resulted in turbulence levels measureable with the ADCP as weak as 3 × 10−8 m2 s−3. The value and trade-off of changing the ADCP cell size, which reduces noise but also changes the ratio of the Thorpe scale to the cell size, are discussed as well. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A total of 96 finestructure and 30 microstructure full-depth vertical profiles were collected along the A25 Greenland-Portugal Observatoire de la Variabilité Interannuelle et Décennale en Atlantique Nord (OVIDE) hydrographic line in 2008. The microstructure of the horizontal velocity was used to calculate turbulent kinetic energy dissipation rates εvmp, where vmp refers to the vertical microstructure profiler. The lowest dissipation values ( εvmp < 0.5 × 10−10 W kg−1) are found below 2000 m in the Iberian Abyssal Plain and in the center of the Irminger basin; the largest values (>5 × 10−10 W kg−1) are found in the main thermocline, around the Reykjanes Ridge, and in a 1000-m-thick layer above the bottom near 48°N. The finestructure of density was used to estimate isopycnal strain and that of the lowered acoustic Doppler current profiler to estimate the vertical shear of horizontal velocities. Strain and shear were used to estimate dissipation rates εG03 (Gregg et al.) associated with the internal wave field. The shear-to-strain ratio correction term of the finescale parameterization εG03 brings the fine- and microscale estimates of the dissipation rate into better agreement as Polzin et al. found. The latitude/buoyancy frequency term slightly improves the parameterization for weakly stratified waters. Correction term εG03 is consistent with εvmp within a factor of 4.5 over 95% of the profiles. This good consistency suggests that most of the turbulent activity recorded in this dataset is due to the internal wave field. The canonical globally averaged diffusivity value of order 10−4 m2 s−1 needed to maintain the global abyssal stratification (Munk) is only reached on the flank of the Reykjanes Ridge and in the region around 48°N. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As currents flow over rough topography, the pressure difference between the up- and downstream sides results in form drag-a force that opposes the flow. Measuring form drag is valuable because it can be used to estimate the loss of energy from currents as they interact with topography. An array of bottom pressure sensors was used to measure the tidal form drag on a sloping ridge in 200 m of water that forms a 1-km headland at the surface in Puget Sound, Washington. The form drag per unit length of the ridge reached 1 × 104 N m−1 during peak flood tides. The tidally averaged power removed from the tidal currents by form drag was 0.2 W m−2, which is 30 times larger than power losses to friction. Form drag is best parameterized by a linear wave drag law as opposed to a bluff body drag law because the flow is stratified and both internal waves and eddies are generated on the sloping topography. Maximum turbulent kinetic energy dissipation rates of 5 × 10−5 W kg−1 were measured with a microstructure profiler and are estimated to account for 25%-50% of energy lost from the tides. This study is among the first to measure form drag directly using bottom pressure sensors. The measurement and analysis techniques presented here are suitable for periodically reversing flows because they require the removal of a time-mean signal. The advantage of this technique is that it delivers a continuous record of form drag and is much less ship intensive compared to previous methods for estimation of the bottom pressure field. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Profiles of potential density obtained from CTD measurements during the Hawaii Ocean Time series (HOT) program in the vicinity of the island of Oahu, Hawaii, are used to evaluate low-frequency variability of turbulent kinetic dissipation rates based on a finescale parameterization method. A distinct seasonal cycle, as well as an increasing trend of dissipation rates, is found in the upper 300-600 m. The trend is mainly due to the much weaker diapycnal mixing in the first four years of the record, that is, 1988-92. In the upper 300-600 m, enhanced diapycnal mixing is found under anticyclonic eddies with the mean dissipation rate about 53% larger than that under eddy-free conditions. The modulation of dissipation rates by anticyclonic eddies becomes more evident with increasing eddy strength. The role of cyclonic eddies in modulating diapycnal mixing is almost negligible compared with that of anticyclonic eddies. The mean dissipation rate under cyclonic eddies is comparable to that under eddy-free conditions with a difference of less than 10%. Seasonality of the dissipation rates is partly modulated by the seasonal variation of anticyclonic eddies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Turbulent mixing is an important process controlling the descent rate, water mass modification, and volume transport augmentation due to entrainment in the dense overflows across the Greenland-Scotland Ridge. These overflows, along with entrained Atlantic waters, form a major portion of the North Atlantic Deep Water, which pervades the abyssal ocean. Three years of Seaglider observations of the overflows across the eastern Greenland-Scotland Ridge are leveraged to map the distribution of dissipation of turbulent kinetic energy on the Iceland-Faroe Ridge. A method has been applied using the finescale vertical velocity and density measurements from the glider to infer dissipation. The method, termed the large-eddy method (LEM), is compared with a microstructure survey of the Faroe Bank Channel (FBC). The LEM reproduces the patterns of dissipation observed in the microstructure survey, which vary over several orders of magnitude. Agreement between the inferred LEM and more direct microstructure measurements is within a factor of 2. Application to the 9432 dives that encountered overflow waters on the Iceland-Faroe Ridge reveals three regions of enhanced dissipation: one downstream of the primary FBC sill, another downstream of the secondary FBC sill, and a final region in a narrow jet of overflow along the Iceland shelf break. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Field observations of turbulent kinetic energy (TKE), dissipation rate ℇε, and turbulent length scale demonstrate the impact of both density stratification and nonlocal turbulent production on turbulent momentum flux. The data were collected in a highly stratified salt wedge estuary using the Mobile Array for Sensing Turbulence (MAST). Estimates of the dominant length scale of turbulent motions obtained from the vertical velocity spectra provide field confirmation of the theoretical limitation imposed by either the distance to the boundary or the Ozmidov scale, whichever is smaller. Under boundary-limited conditions, anisotropy generally increases with increasing shear and decreased distance to the boundary. Under Ozmidov-limited conditions, anisotropy increases rapidly when the gradient Richardson number exceeds 0.25. Both boundary-limited and Ozmidov-limited conditions demonstrate significant deviations from a local production--dissipation balance that are largely consistent with simple scaling relationships for the vertical divergence in TKE flux. Both the impact of stratification and deviation from equilibrium turbulence observed in the data are largely consistent with commonly used turbulence closure models that employ ''nonequilibrium'' stability functions. The data compare most favorably with the nonequilibrium version of the L. H. Kantha and C. A. Clayson stability functions. Not only is this approach more consistent with the observed critical gradient Richardson number of 0.25, but it also accounts for the large deviations from equilibrium turbulence in a manner consistent with the observations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A method of estimating dissipation rates from a vertically pointing Doppler lidar with high temporal and spatial resolution has been evaluated by comparison with independent measurements derived from a balloon-borne sonic anemometer. This method utilizes the variance of the mean Doppler velocity from a number of sequential samples and requires an estimate of the horizontal wind speed. The noise contribution to the variance can be estimated from the observed signal-to-noise ratio and removed where appropriate. The relative size of the noise variance to the observed variance provides a measure of the confidence in the retrieval. Comparison with in situ dissipation rates derived from the balloon-borne sonic anemometer reveal that this particular Doppler lidar is capable of retrieving dissipation rates over a range of at least three orders of magnitude. This method is most suitable for retrieval of dissipation rates within the convective well-mixed boundary layer where the scales of motion that the Doppler lidar probes remain well within the inertial subrange. Caution must be applied when estimating dissipation rates in more quiescent conditions. For the particular Doppler lidar described here, the selection of suitably short integration times will permit this method to be applicable in such situations but at the expense of accuracy in the Doppler velocity estimates. The two case studies presented here suggest that, with profiles every 4 s, reliable estimates of ε can be derived to within at least an order of magnitude throughout almost all of the lowest 2 km and, in the convective boundary layer, to within 50%. Increasing the integration time for individual profiles to 30 s can improve the accuracy substantially but potentially confines retrievals to within the convective boundary layer. Therefore, optimization of certain instrument parameters may be required for specific implementations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]