Nonhydrostatic aspects of coastal upwelling meanders and filaments off eastern ocean boundaries

Abstract

Coastal upwelling meanders and filaments are common features off eastern ocean boundaries. Their growth is reinvestigated herein using a nonhydrostatic three-dimensional model and a reduced-gravity model, with the objective of assessing contributions from two mechanisms that emerge in the nonhydrostatic regime. The first mechanism is caused by the vertical projection of the Coriolis force in the momentum equation. It is found that the vertical Coriolis force often acts as a restoring force against numerical damping off eastern ocean boundaries and thus enhances the growth of meanders and filaments. The second mechanism arises from unstable ocean stratification when the cold upwelled water intrudes seaward over the warm layer. The unstable stratification, albeit transient, further enhances the growth of meanders and filaments. It is concluded that although nonhydrostatic effects do not change our understanding of how meanders and filaments grow, the realism can be enhanced using a nonhydrostatic model insofar as meanders and filaments off eastern ocean boundaries are concerned.