Abstract
The term ‘variangular’ is introduced to emphasize a significant difference between the present and certain earlier solutions to the problem of organized airmotion within the planetary boundary layer. The latter belong to the family of equiangular wind spirals and have the characteristic that the angle (ψ) formed by the vectors of shearing stress and geostrophic departure is invariant with height; it is shown that in this spiral-family, parabolic height-dependency of the effective (eddy) diffusivity (K) alone is permitted, including the asymptotic case of constant K; the famous Ekman spiral as well as the Rossby spiral are two prominent members of the family of equiangular wind spirals. The new variangular theory, as the name implies, permits variation of ψ with height (z) and produces more versatile profiles of wind and stress due to less restraint in K (z). As an example of comparison with observed data, monthly mean wind profiles obtained at Plateau Station, Antarctica, are selected since they exhibit a noteworthy degree of ‘variangularity’, in relatively satisfactory agreement with properties of the new theoretical model for wind spirals.
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National Research Council Visiting Scientist Research Associate, Regional Environments Division, Earth Sciences Laboratory.
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Lettau, H.H., Dabberdt, W.F. Variangular wind spirals. Boundary-Layer Meteorol 1, 64–79 (1970). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00193905
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00193905