Tidal Conversion by Supercritical Topography
Author(s)
Balmforth, Neil J.; Peacock, Thomas
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Calculations are presented of the rate of energy conversion of the barotropic tide into internal gravity waves above topography on the ocean floor. The ocean is treated as infinitely deep, and the topography consists of periodic obstructions; a Green function method is used to construct the scattered wavefield. The calculations extend the previous results of Balmforth et al. for subcritical topography (wherein waves propagate along rays whose slopes exceed that of the topography everywhere), by allowing the obstacles to be arbitrarily steep or supercritical (so waves propagate at shallower angles than the topographic slopes and are scattered both up and down). A complicated pattern is found for the dependence of energy conversion on , the ratio of maximum topographic slope to wave slope, and the ratio of obstacle amplitude and separation. This results from a sequence of constructive and destructive interferences between scattered waves that has implications for computing tidal conversion rates for the global ocean.
Date issued
2009-08Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Mechanical EngineeringJournal
Journal of Physical Oceanography
Publisher
American Meteorological Society
Citation
Balmforth, Neil J, and Thomas Peacock. “Tidal Conversion by Supercritical Topography.” Journal of Physical Oceanography (2009): 1965-1974. © 2009 American Meteorological Society
Version: Final published version
ISSN
0022-3670