Numerical study on the spatial and temporal characteristics of nonlinear internal wave energy in the Northern South China sea

Jin, Guangzhen; Lai, Zhigang; Shang, Xiaodong

doi:10.1016/j.dsr.2021.103640

Cited by 5 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 66 publications

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“…The horizontal features of internal tides crossing the northern SCS were successfully reproduced by the SP model. Specifically, the propagation of waves with a height of up to 200 m, their subsequent shoaling and interaction with the Dongsha Atoll, identifiable in satellite images (Alford et al., 2015; Jin et al., 2021), were well captured by the SP model. However, these features were almost indistinguishable in the MR model (Figure 4b).…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 94%

Impact of Horizontal Resolution (Submesoscale Permitting vs. Mesoscale Resolving) on Ocean Dynamic Features in the South China Sea

Jia

et al. 2022

Earth and Space Science

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South China Sea (SCS) is the largest semi-enclosed marginal Sea in the world and is in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with a deep central basin, encompassed by continental shelf and seamounts (Figure 1). It is connected to the Pacific Ocean via the Luzon Strait (LS), the East China Sea through the Taiwan Strait, the Sulu Sea through the Mindoro Strait, and the Java Sea via the Karimata Strait at the southern end. Forced by Asian monsoons with prevailing northeasterly and southwesterly winds in winter and summer, respectively, the upper layer circulation of the SCS is predominantly characterized by a basin-wide cyclonic gyre with a southward jet along the western boundary during winter (Gan et al., 2006;Wyrtki, 1961), and a strong anticyclonic and a weakened cyclonic gyre during summer, with a northward jet flowing from the southwestern SCS eastward off the east coast of Indo-China Peninsula at 12°N (Wang et al., 2006).

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 94%

Impact of Horizontal Resolution (Submesoscale Permitting vs. Mesoscale Resolving) on Ocean Dynamic Features in the South China Sea

Jia

et al. 2022

Earth and Space Science

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“…3D/2D models with different numbers of barotropic tidal constituents (e.g., single harmonic, four harmonics and eight harmonics) were commonly imposed to investigate the generation mechanisms of ISWs in the NSCS in previous studies (e.g., Li, 2014;Jin et al, 2021). However, whether a single tidal constituent can satisfy the reproduction of a real ISW field and how many tidal constituents are required for a realistic ISW model are still questions.…”

Section: Requirements Of Tidal Constituentsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Even though numbers of previous in-situ observations have shown the four barotropic tidal constituents (M2, K1, O1 and S2) are dominant at the Luzon Strait (Zhao and Alford, 2006;Farmer et al, 2009), the other barotropic tidal constituents (e.g., N2, K2, P1 and Q1) are also non-negligible (Beardsley et al, 2004). Historically, numerical simulations with different numbers of tidal constituents have been widely employed to investigate the physical dynamics of ISWs in the NSCS, i.e., single K1 harmonic (Li, 2014), four tidal harmonics , and eight primary tidal harmonics (Alford et al, 2015;Jin et al, 2021). Among these, eight tidal constituents were most commonly applied in the 3D models.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

An internal solitary wave forecasting model in the northern South China Sea (ISWFM-NSCS)

Gong

Chen

et al. 2023

Preprint

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Abstract. Internal solitary waves (ISWs) are a ubiquitous phenomenon in the dynamic ocean system, which play a crucial role in driving transport through turbulent mixing. Over the past few decades, numerical modelling became a vital approach to investigate the generation mechanism and spatial distribution of ISWs. The northern South China Sea (NSCS) has been treated as a physical oceanographic focus of ISWs in massive numerical studies since last century. However, there was no systematic evaluation of a reliable three-dimensional model about accurately reproducing ISW characteristics in the NSCS. In this study, we implement a three-dimensional ISW forecasting model in the NSCS and quantitatively evaluate the requirements of factors (i.e., model resolution, tidal forcing, and stratification selection) in precisely depicting ISW properties by comparing with observational data at a mooring station in the vicinity of the Dongsha Atoll. Firstly, the 500 m-resolution model can basically reproduce the principal ISW characteristics, while the 250 m-resolution model would be a better solution to identify wave properties, specifically increasing 40 % accuracy of predicting characteristic half-widths. Nonetheless, a 250 m-resolution model spends nearly fivefold computational resources of a 500 m-resolution model in the same model domain. Compared with the former two, the model with a lower resolution of 1000 m severely underestimates the nonlinearity of ISWs, resulting in an incorrect ISW field in the NSCS. Secondly, the model with eight (or thirteen) primary tidal constituents can accurately reproduce the real ISW field in the NSCS, while the one with four main harmonics (M2, S2, K1 and O1) would underestimate averaged wave-induced velocity for about 38 % and averaged mode-1 wave amplitude for about 15 %. Thirdly, the model with the initial condition of field-extracted stratification gives a better performance in predicting some wave properties than the model with climatological stratification, namely 13 % improvement of arrival time and 46 % improvement of characteristic half-width. Finally, background currents, spatially varying stratification and external (wind) forcing are discussed to reproduce a more realistic ISW field in the future numerical simulations.

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“…Many studies have explored the generation and distribution of internal waves (Chen et al, 2011;Guo et al, 2011;Guo and Chen, 2014). Internal solitary waves (ISWs) have been detected in many regions of the World's oceans through in-situ observations and satellite images and have attracted considerable attention over the past few decades because of their ubiquity (Helfrich and Melville, 2006;Jia et al, 2018;Jin et al, 2021). ISWs originating from different locations may meet during propagation and thus wave-wave interactions occur.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Three-dimensional numerical simulations of oblique internal solitary wave-wave interactions in the South China Sea

Jia,

Gong,

Zhang

et al. 2024

Front. Mar. Sci.

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Satellite images show that the oblique internal solitary wave-wave interactions frequently occur in the South China Sea, especially in the periphery of Dongsha Island. Depending on the amplitudes and angles of initial oblique waves, theoretical works illustrated that the evolution pattern falls into different regimes characterised by the respective four-fold augmentation of wave amplitudes (relative to the initial waves) and occurrence of Mach stem waves in the interaction region. Nevertheless, these results were based on the reduced theories rooted from the primitive Navier-Stokes equations and the disparities induced by these simplifications with the scenarios in realistic ocean are still unclear. To fill this research gap, three-dimensional numerical simulations in the South China Sea are used to evaluate the oblique internal solitary wave-wave interactions. It is found that transformations between mode-1 and mode-2 waves occur near the Dongsha Island when two waves obliquely collide, together with a small portion of energy is converted into higher modes, most of which is dissipated locally due to their unstable vertical structures. This conclusion has been seldom reported in previous studies (if any). These oblique interactions are essentially nonlinear and impacted by the dynamical factors, such as varying depth, background current, etc., exhibiting complicated variations of waveforms and energy, which, further, enhance the mixing at local sites in the mechanism of both shear and convective instabilities indicated by the Richardson number.

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Numerical study on the spatial and temporal characteristics of nonlinear internal wave energy in the Northern South China sea

Cited by 5 publications

References 66 publications

Impact of Horizontal Resolution (Submesoscale Permitting vs. Mesoscale Resolving) on Ocean Dynamic Features in the South China Sea

Impact of Horizontal Resolution (Submesoscale Permitting vs. Mesoscale Resolving) on Ocean Dynamic Features in the South China Sea

An internal solitary wave forecasting model in the northern South China Sea (ISWFM-NSCS)

Three-dimensional numerical simulations of oblique internal solitary wave-wave interactions in the South China Sea

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