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Turbulence and fossil turbulence in oceans and lakes

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Abstract

Turbulence is defined as an eddy-like state of fluid motion where the intertial-vortex forces of the eddies are larger than any of the other forces that tend to damp the eddies out. Energy cascades of irrotational flows from large scales to small are non-turbulent, even if they supply energy to turbulence. Turbulent flows are rotational and cascade from small scales to large, with feedback. Viscous forces limit the smallest turbulent eddy size to the Kolmogorov scale. In stratified fluids, buoyancy forces limit large vertical overturns to the Ozmidov scale and convert the largest turbulent eddies into a unique class of saturated, non-propagating, internal waves, termed fossil-vorticity-turbulence. These waves have the same energy but different properties and spectral forms than the original turbulence patch. The Gibson (1980, 1986) theory of fossil turbulence applies universal similarity theories of turbulence and turbulent mixing to the vertical evolution of an isolated patch of turbulence in a stratified fluid as its growth is constrained and fossilized by buoyancy forces. Quantitative hydrodynamic-phase-diagrams (HPDs) from the theory are used to classify microstructure patches according to their hydrodynamic states. When analyzed in HPD space, previously published oceanic datasets showed their dominant microstructure patches are fossilized at large scales in all layers. Laboratory and field measurements suggested phytoplankton species with different swimming abilities adjust their growth strategies by pattern recognition of turbulence-fossil-turbulence dissipation and persistence times that predict survival-relevant surface layer sea changes. New data collected near a Honolulu waste-water outfall showed the small-to-large evolution of oceanic turbulence microstructure from active to fossil states, and revealed the ability of fossil-density-tubulence patches to absorb, and vertically radiate, internal wave energy, information, and enhanced turbulent-mixing-rates toward the sea surface so that the submerged waste-field could be detected from a space satellite (Bondur and Filatov, 2003).

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  1. Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, University of California San Diego, 92093-0411, La Jolla, CA, USA

    Pak-Tao Leung

  2. Departments of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering and Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California San Diego, 92093-0411, CA, La Jolla, USA

    Carl H. Gibson

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Leung, PT., Gibson, C.H. Turbulence and fossil turbulence in oceans and lakes. Chin. J. Ocean. Limnol. 22, 1–23 (2004). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02842796

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