Bivariate conditional sampling of buoyancy flux during an intense cold-air outbreak

Abstract

Buoyancy fluxes in the marine atmospheric boundary layer (MABL) for the cloud street regime, observed during the Genesis of Atlantic Lows Experiment (GALE), have been analyzed using the technique of joint frequency distribution. For the lower half of the MABL, the results suggest that the buoyancy flux is mainly generated by the rising thermals and the sinking compensating ambient air, and is mainly consumed by the entrainment and detrainment of thermals, penetrative convection, and the entrainment from the MABL top. The results are compared to those from previous studies of mesoscale cellular convection (Air-Mass Transformation Experiment, AMTEX), the dry convective boundary layer, and the trade-wind MABL. For the lower MABL, the quadrant buoyancy fluxes, fractional coverages, and flux intensities are in good agreement with those of mesoscale cellular convection (AMTEX) and the dry convective boundary layer. The results suggest that, if the buoyancy flux is primarily driven by the temperature flux, the physical processes for generating buoyancy flux mentioned above are about the same for the lower boundary layers over land and ocean, even with different convective regimes. For the trade-wind MABL, the buoyancy flux is mainly driven by the moisture flux; the quadrant flux intensities are stronger than those of the other three studies except for the buoyant updrafts (thermals). These results suggest that the entrainment and detrainment of thermals are more effective in the trade-wind MABL than in the boundary layers driven by the temperature flux. Scale analysis of the buoyancy flux is in good agreement with that of AMTEX. For the lower half of the MABL, the buoyancy flux is mainly generated by the intermediate scale (200 m to 2 km), which includes the dominant convective thermals in the surface layer and the mixed layer. The scale smaller than 200 m is important only in the surface layer. The scale larger than 2 km, which includes the roll vortices, increases its significance upward. While most of the positive and negative fluxes are associated with the updrafts for the intermediate scale, the downdrafts are as important as updrafts for the larger scale.