Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
The extratropical or midlatitude mixed layer was shown in one study to be more affected by diurnal variability than the results of the two tropical ocean studies. Over a 15-day study period in Australia, the diurnal mixed layer cycle repeated in a consistent manner with decaying turbulence throughout the day.
Not all mixing is driven by density changes. Other physical forces may also mix stably-stratified layers. Sea spray and whitecaps (foaming whitewater on waves) are examples of water mixed into air, and air into water, respectively. In a fierce storm the air/water boundary may grow indistinct. Some of these wind waves are Kelvin-Helmholtz waves. [1]
In viscous fluid dynamics, the Archimedes number (Ar), is a dimensionless number used to determine the motion of fluids due to density differences, named after the ancient Greek scientist and mathematician Archimedes. It is the ratio of gravitational forces to viscous forces [1] and has the form: [2]
A stratified fluid may be defined as the fluid with density variations in the vertical direction. For example, air and water; both are fluids and if we consider them together then they can be seen as a stratified fluid system. Density variations in the atmosphere profoundly affect the motion of water and air.
Therefore, the shape of the open surface of a fluid equals the equipotential plane of the applied outer conservative force field. Let the z-axis point downward. In this case the field is gravity, so Φ = −ρ f gz where g is the gravitational acceleration, ρ f is the mass density of the fluid.
In the Boussinesq approximation, variations in fluid properties other than density ρ are ignored, and density only appears when it is multiplied by g, the gravitational acceleration. [2]: 127–128 If u is the local velocity of a parcel of fluid, the continuity equation for conservation of mass is [2]: 52
Increasing the temperature of a substance (with a few exceptions) decreases its density by increasing its volume. In most materials, heating the bottom of a fluid results in convection of the heat from the bottom to the top, due to the decrease in the density of the heated fluid, which causes it to rise relative to denser unheated material.
In fluid dynamics, convective mixing is the vertical transport of a fluid and its properties. In many important ocean and atmospheric phenomena, convection is driven by density differences in the fluid, e.g. the sinking of cold, dense water in polar regions of the world's oceans; and the rising of warm, less-dense air during the formation of cumulonimbus clouds and hurricanes.