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A linear stability analysis of stratocumulus convection driven by
radiative cooling
Philip H. Austin
Tellus, Winter 1995,47A pages 259-274.
Abstract
Fully cloudy stratocumulus layers sometimes exhibit convective
organization at a single dominant length scale with an aspect ratio
(width/height) \approx 1. We present a linear stability analysis of a
radiatively-cooled cloud beneath a capping inversion and show that
small aspect ratio modes are energetically favored over a broad range
of inversion strengths and cooling depths. The integrated mode energy
budgets indicate that, give a vertically limited region of radiative
cooling, highly dissipative, localized convective modes can grow
through efficient buoyancy production beneath the inversion.
Including the effect of decoupling on the sub-cloud layer enhances
this scale selection but as the depth of the unstable layer is
increased beyond 20% of the boundary layer depth, the critical
Rayleigh number and the aspect ratio of the fastest growing mode
approach that of a layer capped by a no-slip rigid lid.
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