Planetary Climate Dynamics

Abstract:

We have investigated the formation of jet scale meridional circulation cells on Jupiter in response to radiative and zonal momentum forcing. In the framework of semi-geostrophic theory, the meridional streamfunction is described by an elliptic equation with a source term dependent on the sum of the latitudinal derivative of the radiative forcing and the vertical derivative of the zonal momentum forcing. Using this equation with analytic terms similar to the assumed forcing on Jupiter, we obtained two set of atmospheric circulations cells, a stratospheric and a tropospheric one. A possible shift in the overturning circulation of the high and deep atmosphere can be induced by breaking the latitudinal alignment of radiative heating with the enforced belt and zones. A series of numerical simulations was conducted with the Jovian GCM OPUS, which was initiated with observational data obtained from the Cassini CIRS temperature cross-section and a corresponding geostrophic zonal wind field. Newtonian forcing of potential temperature as well as zonal momentum was applied respectively towards latitudinally and vertically uniform equilibrium fields. In accordance with the analytic illustrations two rows of jet scale circulation cells were created. The stratospheric circulation showed the distribution of upwelling over zones and downwelling over belts, consistent with cloud observations. The tropospheric cells featured a partial reversal of the downward vertical velocity over the belts and a considerable reduction of the upward movement over the zones in the domain, consistent with recent detections of high water clouds and lightning in belts. We also used the modeled new forcing fields as source terms for the semi-geostrophic Poisson equation to attribute the origin of the modeled secondary circulation. In this analysis, the stratospheric circulation cells observed in the model are primarily generated in response to radiative forcing, while momentum forcing induces the shifted configurations in the deep atmosphere. © 2008 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Abstract:

A simple jovian cloud scheme has been developed for the Oxford Planetary Unified model System (OPUS). NH3-ice, NH4SH-solid, H2O-ice and H2O-liquid clouds have been modeled in Southern hemisphere limited area simulations of Jupiter. We found that either three or four of the condensates existed in the model. For a deep atmospheric water abundance close to solar composition, an NH3-ice deck above 0.7 bar, an NH4SH-solid deck above 2.5 bar and a H2O-liquid deck with a base at about 7.5 bar and frozen cloud tops formed. If a depleted deep water abundance is assumed, however, a very compact cloud structure develops, where an H2O-ice cloud forms by direct sublimation above 3 bar. The condensates constitute good tracers of atmospheric motion, and we have confirmed that zonal velocities determined from manual feature tracking in the modeled cloud layers agree reasonably well with the modeled zonal velocities. Dense and elevated clouds form over latitudes with strong atmospheric upwelling and depleted clouds exist over areas with strong downwelling. In the NH3-ice deck this leads to elevated cloud bands over the zones in the domain and thin clouds over the belts, which is consistent with the observationally deduced distribution. Due to changes in the vertical velocity pattern in the deeper atmosphere, the NH4SH-solid and water cloud decks are more uniform. This modeled cloud structure thus includes the possibility of more frequent water cloud observations in belts, as this deeper deck could be more easily detected under areas with thin NH3-ice clouds. Large scale vortices appeared spontaneously in the model and were characterized by elevated NH3-ice clouds, as expected from observations. These eddies leave the most discernible imprint on the lighter condensate particles of the uppermost layer. © 2008 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.