Meta-stability of equilibrium statistical structures for prototype geophysical flows with damping and driving (Q5942854)

The authors examine the equilibrium statistical theory of a quasigeostrophic flow in a periodic channel at mid-latitude. Quasigeostrophic equations are solved numerically using a pseudospectral method. The gradients of streamfunction and the potential vorticity are calculated in Fourier space, and the nonlinear product of streamfunction and potential vorticity are calculated at the mesh points in physical space. In this numerical simulation, the resolution of the numerical grid is varied from \(64\times 64\) to \(256\times 256\). The numerical experiments were performed on Cray T90. As applications, the author investigate the meta-stability of vortex monopoles, vortex dipole street and shear flow. This study includes both direct and inverse cascade regimes. In the first regime, energy is transferred from large to small scales where dissipation of energy is more efficient. In the second regime, strong small-scale forcing near the scales of resolution maintains the energy transfer from small scale to the largest one. The authors show that for all investigated regimes that include pure decay, both damping and driving effects, and both direct and inverse cascade of energy, statistically most probable states evolve into other most probable states with high accuracy. The authors also develop a special algorithm for construction of most probable equilibrium states which is based on the calculation of relative errors between velocity fields and vorticity fields. The algorithm predicts qualitatively correctly the topological structures in evolving flow regimes. It is demonstrated that the small-scale forcing maintains weak vortex streets, but the strong forcing excites strong vortex street. The first result is predicted by the equilibrium theory, and the second results is obtained numerically.