Abstract
Laboratory experiments were conducted to simulate the diurnal heating-cooling cycle in the vicinity of a ridge of constant cross section. In the model the fluid is a water solution stratified with salt to simulate the background stratification of the atmosphere. The flow is driven by recirculating water of a controlled temperature beneath the model; the model surface temperature is thus varied in a specified way to simulate the surface heating by solar insolation during the daytime hours and surface cooling by radiation during the nighttime.
The pertinent similarity parameters are shown to be Gc, for daytime convective flow and Gd for nocturnal flow; here Gc = Hb/Hc, Gd = Hb/Hd, where Hb, is the mountain height, Hc the neutral buoyancy height of free convection. and Hd the characteristic thickness of the nighttime drainage flow. The model demonstrates some of the principal features of thermally driven mountain circulations, including daytime upslope winds and nocturnal downslope drainage flows. The spatial and temporal structures of these motion fields are delineated, with the following being among the most important observations: (i) during the daytime, the upslope convective flow in the vicinity of the mountain tends to suppress convective turbulence over the horizontal plains; (ii) during the early evening, horizontal jets, with the principal one directed toward the mountain, develop above the mountain surface, and vortices in the vertical cross section develop both above and below the jets, following the collapse of the convective motion over the mountain; and (iii) in the evening, a downslope drainage flow is initiated following the establishment of a vertical vortex on the mountain slope and under the jet.
Quantitative experimental observations are made, which demonstrate the variation of various flow observables with the pertinent similarity parameters. These results are applied to the atmosphere following similarity relations between the physical model and the atmosphere. The predicted characteristic speeds and length scales of the daytime upslope flow and the nocturnal drainage flow for typical atmospheric parameters are in reasonable agreement with limited field observations.
