Wave-Mean Flow Interaction: the Role of Continuous-Spectrum Disturbances

作     者：曾庆存 张明华 

作者机构：Institute of Atmospheric Physics Chinese Academy of Sciences Beijing Institute for Terrestrial and Planetary Atmospheres State University of New York at Stony Brook Stony Brook 

出 版 物：《Advances in Atmospheric Sciences》 (大气科学进展（英文版）)

年 卷 期：2000年第17卷第1期

页      面：1-17页

核心收录：

学科分类：07[理学] 070601[理学-气象学] 0706[理学-大气科学] 

主　　题：Maintenance of zonal flow Continuous-spectrum Angular momentum Transport 

摘      要：Traditionally, “ eddy feeds zonal flow in the atmosphere is considered as a result of decaying unstable waves. We show that disturbances made of non-modal solutions -the continuous-spec-trum disturbances-can also effectively transport zonal angular momentum and interact with the zonal basic flow. These disturbances, though stable, eventually decay, losing their energy to strengthen the westerly jets in the atmosphere. Calculations with observational data illustrate that the atmospheric zonal flow is maintained primarily by continuous-spectrum disturbances rather than by unstable waves. Angular momen-tum transport by continuous-spectrum disturbances is one order of magnitude larger than that by all kinds of normal modes (referred as discrete-spectrum disturbances) including unstable waves. Key words Maintenance of zonal flow - Continuous-spectrum - Angular momentum - Transport This research was partly supported by the Chinese Program on Basic Research and by the Institute of Atmospheric Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences. It was also supported by NASA Grant NAGW 3517, and DOE Grant DEFG0285-ER60314 to the State University of New York at Stony Brook.