16th Conference on Atmospheric and Oceanic Fluid Dynamics

P1.2

The LANS-alpha turbulence model in ocean modeling

Mark R. Petersen, LANL, Los Alamos, NM; and M. W. Hecht, D. D. Holm, and B. A. Wingate

The Lagrangian-Averaged Navier-Stokes alpha (LANS-alpha) model is a turbulence model that improves the resolution of small-scale features. Simulations using LANS-alpha in the POP ocean model look like higher resolution simulations of standard POP in statistics like kinetic energy, eddy kinetic energy, and potential temperature fields. The LANS-alpha model accomplishes this improvement through an additional nonlinear term and a smoothed advecting velocity.

I will discuss my implementation of LANS-alpha in POP, and results using an idealized channel domain that invokes the baroclinic instability. I will also compare LANS-alpha to other turbulence models like eddy viscosity and Gent-McWilliams isopycnal tracer mixing.

Poster Session 1, Ocean Dynamics
Monday, 25 June 2007, 5:00 PM-6:30 PM, Ballroom North

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