A coupled surface boundary-layer-quasigeostrophic model

Abstract

A three-dimensional model of the mesoscale surface boundary layer of the open ocean is developed through scale analysis of the primitive equations with mixing included. A set of surface boundary-layer equations appropriate for a broad range of oceanic and atmospheric scales is thereby derived. The essential basis of the model is a coupling between quasigeostrophic dynamics away from the boundary layer and arbitrary mixing models within the mixed layer. The coupling consists of advection of the boundary layer by the horizontal and vertical components of the interior quasigeostrophic flow and forcing of the interior by the boundary layer in the form of divergence within the boundary layer which leads to vortex stretching/compression in the interior. The divergence is generalized for mesoscale wind-driven flows and includes nonlinear interaction between the directly wind-driven boundary-layer flow and the interior flow in the form of interior relative vorticity advection by the wind-driven flow. The nature of the equations leads us to apply a numerical algorithm to their solution. This algorithm is calibrated through application to idealized problems to determine the temporal and spatial grid requirements. The model is initialized with a realistic ocean flow having the properties of the Gulf Stream.