15,911 research outputs found

    Atmospheric Circulation of Hot Jupiters: A Shallow Three-Dimensional Model

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    Remote observing of exoplanetary atmospheres is now possible, offering us access to circulation regimes unlike any of the familiar Solar System cases. Atmospheric circulation models are being developed to study these new regimes but model validations and intercomparisons are needed to establish their consistency and accuracy. To this end, we present a simple Earth-like validation of the pseudo-spectral solver of meteorological equations called IGCM (Intermediate General Circulation Model), based on Newtonian relaxation to a prescribed latitudinal profile of equilibrium temperatures. We then describe a straightforward and idealized model extension to the atmospheric flow on a hot Jupiter with the same IGCM solver. This shallow, three-dimensional hot Jupiter model is based on Newtonian relaxation to a permanent day-night pattern of equilibrium temperatures and the absence of surface drag. The baroclinic regime of the Earth's lower atmosphere is contrasted with the more barotropic regime of the simulated hot Jupiter flow. For plausible conditions at the 0.1-1 bar pressure level on HD 209458b, the simulated flow is characterized by unsteadiness, subsonic wind speeds, a zonally-perturbed superrotating equatorial jet and large scale polar vortices. Violation of the Rayleigh-Kuo inflexion point criterion on the flanks of the accelerating equatorial jet indicates that barotropic (horizontal shear) instabilities may be important dynamical features of the simulated flow. Similarities and differences with previously published simulated hot Jupiter flows are briefly noted.Comment: 31 pages, 9 figures, accepted for publication in ApJ. Version with hi-res figures: http://www.astro.columbia.edu/~kristen/Hires/hotjup.3d.shallow.ps.g

    ASHEE: a compressible, equilibrium-Eulerian model for volcanic ash plumes

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    A new fluid-dynamic model is developed to numerically simulate the non-equilibrium dynamics of polydisperse gas-particle mixtures forming volcanic plumes. Starting from the three-dimensional N-phase Eulerian transport equations for a mixture of gases and solid particles, we adopt an asymptotic expansion strategy to derive a compressible version of the first-order non-equilibrium model, valid for low concentration regimes and small particles Stokes St<0.2St<0.2. When St<0.001St < 0.001 the model reduces to the dusty-gas one. The new model is significantly faster than the Eulerian model while retaining the capability to describe gas-particle non-equilibrium. Direct numerical simulation accurately reproduce the dynamics of isotropic turbulence in subsonic regime. For gas-particle mixtures, it describes the main features of density fluctuations and the preferential concentration of particles by turbulence, verifying the model reliability and suitability for the simulation of high-Reynolds number and high-temperature regimes. On the other hand, Large-Eddy Numerical Simulations of forced plumes are able to reproduce their observed averaged and instantaneous properties. The self-similar radial profile and the development of large-scale structures are reproduced, including the rate of entrainment of atmospheric air. Application to the Large-Eddy Simulation of the injection of the eruptive mixture in a stratified atmosphere describes some of important features of turbulent volcanic plumes, including air entrainment, buoyancy reversal, and maximum plume height. Coarse particles partially decouple from the gas within eddies, modifying the turbulent structure, and preferentially concentrate at the eddy periphery, eventually being lost from the plume margins due to the gravity. By these mechanisms, gas-particle non-equilibrium is able to influence the large-scale behavior of volcanic plumes.Comment: 29 pages, 22 figure

    Using the UM dynamical cores to reproduce idealised 3D flows

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    We demonstrate that both the current (New Dynamics), and next generation (ENDGame) dynamical cores of the UK Met Office global circulation model, the UM, reproduce consistently, the long-term, large-scale flows found in several published idealised tests. The cases presented are the Held-Suarez test, a simplified model of Earth (including a stratosphere), and a hypothetical tidally locked Earth. Furthermore, we show that using simplifications to the dynamical equations, which are expected to be justified for the physical domains and flow regimes we have studied, and which are supported by the ENDGame dynamical core, also produces matching long-term, large-scale flows. Finally, we present evidence for differences in the detail of the planetary flows and circulations resulting from improvements in the ENDGame formulation over New Dynamics.Comment: 34 Pages, 23 Figures. Accepted for publication in Geoscientific Model Development (pre-proof version

    A scheme for computing surface layer turbulent fluxes from mean flow surface observations

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    A physical model and computational scheme are developed for generating turbulent surface stress, sensible heat flux and humidity flux from mean velocity, temperature and humidity at some fixed height in the atmospheric surface layer, where conditions at this reference level are presumed known from observations or the evolving state of a numerical atmospheric circulation model. The method is based on coupling the Monin-Obukov surface layer similarity profiles which include buoyant stability effects on mean velocity, temperature and humidity to a force-restore formulation for the evolution of surface soil temperature to yield the local values of shear stress, heat flux and surface temperature. A self-contained formulation is presented including parameterizations for solar and infrared radiant fluxes at the surface. Additional parameters needed to implement the scheme are the thermal heat capacity of the soil per unit surface area, surface aerodynamic roughness, latitude, solar declination, surface albedo, surface emissivity and atmospheric transmissivity to solar radiation

    Addressing the challenges of implementation of high-order finite volume schemes for atmospheric dynamics of unstructured meshes

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    The solution of the non-hydrostatic compressible Euler equations using Weighted Essentially Non-Oscillatory (WENO) schemes in two and three-dimensional unstructured meshes, is presented. Their key characteristics are their simplicity; accuracy; robustness; non-oscillatory properties; versatility in handling any type of grid topology; computational and parallel efficiency. Their defining characteristic is a non-linear combination of a series of high-order reconstruction polynomials arising from a series of reconstruction stencils. In the present study an explicit TVD Runge-Kutta 3rd -order method is employed due to its lower computational resources requirement compared to implicit type time advancement methods. The WENO schemes (up to 5th -order) are applied to the two dimensional and three dimensional test cases: a 2D rising
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