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Dynamics of vorticity fronts

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 April 2006

Melvin E. Stern  and
Lawrence J. Pratt
Melvin E. Stern
Affiliation:
Graduate School of Oceanography, University of Rhode Island, Kingston, Rhode Island 02881
Lawrence J. Pratt
Affiliation:
Graduate School of Oceanography, University of Rhode Island, Kingston, Rhode Island 02881 Present address: Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, Woods Hole, MA 02543.
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Abstract

Vorticity fronts can form in a shear flow as the result of fast patches of fluid catching up with slower ones. This process and its consequences are studied in an inviscid two-dimensional model consisting of piecewise uniform-vorticity layers. Calculations using the method of contour dynamics for ‘intrusive’ initial states indicate that the leading edge of the front evolves into a robust structure whose propagation speed can be accounted for by a simple shock-joining theory. Behind the leading edge several different effects can occur depending upon the relative amplitude of the intrusion. These effects include lee-wave generation with possible wave breaking and folding of the front. A critical value of the frontal slope, above which wave breaking occurs, is suggested.

Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of Fluid Mechanics , Volume 161 , December 1985 , pp. 513 - 532
Copyright
© 1985 Cambridge University Press

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