Abstract: Parameterization for Submesoscale-Permitting Simulations: From Ideal to Traditional to Novel Including Symmetric Instabilities (2016 Ocean Sciences Meeting)

Parameterization for Submesoscale-Permitting Simulations: From Ideal to Traditional to Novel Including Symmetric Instabilities

Jinxuan Zhu¹, Baylor Fox-Kemper², Scott Bachman³, Luke P Van Roekel⁴, Peter Hamlington⁵, John Ryan Taylor³ and Leif N Thomas⁶, (1)Brown University, Earth Environment and Planetary Science, Providence, RI, United States, (2)Brown University, Providence, RI, United States, (3)University of Cambridge, Cambridge, United Kingdom, (4)Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, NM, United States, (5)Univ of Colorado, Boulder, CO, United States, (6)Stanford University, Stanford, CA, United States

Abstract:

We test a variety of traditional and new boundary layer turbulence parameterizations using the MITgcm compared to a truth simulation of two nearby fronts under the effects of waves and winds in a 20km by 20km domain using the NCAR LES at 5m horizontal resolution (Hamlington et al., 2014). As the performance of parameterization is varied under different grid resolutions, different parameterization should be chosen in accordance to the grid configuration to represent boundary layer turbulence, Langmuir turbulence, symmetric instabilities, and mixed layer eddies. Using the same initial conditions and forcing as the resolved truth in NCAR LES, we calculate the time series of turbulence contributions as parameterized in the MITgcm. A multi-physics, multi-resolution ensemble of MITgcm simulations are produced and quantified. Different resolutions are tested for understanding how the grid configuration influences parameterizations. We also examine different variables--passive and active tracers, velocity, and energy--to evaluate when the parameterizations are suitable.

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