A laboratory technique for generating a rotating, two-layer stratified channel flow

Abstract

 Results are presented from a series of experiments in which the performance of a new type of rotating, stratified (two-layer) channel flow facility has been tested. The flow within the channel is driven by a source-sink system and is designed specifically to provide uniform, rectilinear, horizontal motion and relatively-quiescent conditions in the upper and lower layers respectively of the two-layer configuration. The channel is shown to perform well in this regard over a wide range of external forcing conditions, with negligible erosion of the diffusive interface separating the two constituent (miscible) homogeneous layers over periods that are long compared with the time scale of a typical laboratory experiment.