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EFFECTS OF STABLE STRATIFICATION ON TURBULENT DIFFUSION AND THE DECAY OF GRID TURBULENCE
Citation:
Britter, R., J. Hunt, G. Marsh, AND W. Snyder. EFFECTS OF STABLE STRATIFICATION ON TURBULENT DIFFUSION AND THE DECAY OF GRID TURBULENCE. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Washington, D.C., EPA/600/J-82/082.
Description:
Experiments are described in which a grid was towed horizontally along a large tank filled first with water and then with a stably stratified saline solution. The decay rates of the root-mean-square (r.m.s.) turbulent velocity components (w',v') perpendicular to the tow direction were measured by a Taylor diffusion probe and found to be unaffected by the stable stratification over the distances measured (5 to 20 mesh lengths downstream) and over a range of Froude number (U/NM) of infinity and 8.5 to 0.5, where M is the mesh length, U the velocity, and N the buoyancy frequency. The vertical turbulence produced at the grid was reduced up to 30% by the stratification when U/MN about 0.5. Large-scale internal wave motion was not evident in the turbulence produced by this horizontally towed grid, in contrast to the motion produced by a vertically towed grid.