Disruption and Formation of Arctic Staircases by Shear
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Authors
Brown, Justin M.
Ainslie, Kristen
Radko, Timour
Subjects
Advisors
Date of Issue
2021
Date
Publisher
ESS Open Archive
Language
Abstract
Though thermohaline staircases exist in a large region of the Arctic, the interactions of such staircases with shear and turbulence are still largely unexplored. We perform a series of two- and three-dimensional simulations with and without shear and demonstrate the capacity of shear to both form and disrupt Arctic staircases. Both isotropic shear and unidirectional oscillating shear are considered. Shear is shown to disrupt staircases when the Richardson number falls below 1/4. For isotropic shear, this process works by breaking down layers individually, which leads to the gradual merging of layers, whereas the unidirectional shear tends to break down interfaces more evenly. For weaker shear (Richardson numbers greater than 2), the spontaneous development of layers is observed.
Type
Preprint
Description
The article of record as published may be found at http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/essoar.10507244.1
Series/Report No
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Identifiers
NPS Report Number
Sponsors
National Science Foundation
Funding
OCE 1756491
Format
13 p.
Citation
Brown, Justin Michael, Kristen Ainslie, and Timour Radko. "Disruption and Formation of Arctic Staircases by Shear." (2021).
Distribution Statement
Rights
This publication is a work of the U.S. Government as defined in Title 17, United States Code, Section 101. Copyright protection is not available for this work in the United States.