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Observations of the turbulent fluxes in fields of cumulus clouds
Author(s) -
Smith Samantha A.,
Jonas Peter R.
Publication year - 1995
Publication title -
quarterly journal of the royal meteorological society
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.744
H-Index - 143
eISSN - 1477-870X
pISSN - 0035-9009
DOI - 10.1002/qj.49712152602
Subject(s) - atmospheric sciences , entrainment (biomusicology) , cloud top , marine stratocumulus , turbulence kinetic energy , environmental science , kinetic energy , turbulence , cloud base , energy flux , meteorology , geology , physics , cloud computing , aerosol , astronomy , satellite , quantum mechanics , rhythm , acoustics , computer science , operating system
Aircraft observations in fields of small maritime cumulus clouds around the British Isles have been analysed to yield kinetic energy spectra and vertical turbulent fluxes, both within clouds and in the clear regions between clouds, for five cases where a cool airmass flowed over a warmer sea surface. the flights were made at various times of the year. Profiles of the kinetic energy and turbulent fluxes have been obtained from observations made at several levels. It is shown that, while the dominant source of turbulent kinetic energy may be due to evaporative cooling following entrainment at cloud top, in some cloud fields production by latent heating near cloud base dominates. the location of the dominant energy source depends on whether the clouds penetrate the inversion sufficiently for instability due to cloud‐top entrainment to occur. While the resulting flux profiles observed in some of the cases examined here resemble those observed in stratocumulus, profiles of similar shape are not always observed, and there are significant differences between cumulus layers and stratocumulus in the magnitudes of the fluxes.