Paper detail

Identify the diapycnical eddy diffusivities by salt fingers and turbulence with vertical microstructure measurements

Diapycnical eddy diffusivities are formulated from physical relations according to a simple fact that the different formulas are identical for the same parameter. It is found that the dispassion ratio Γis a crucial parameter. When it is above a critical value (about 0.2), the flow is salt finger type; otherwise, it is turbulence. All the density ratio $R_ρ=1/(1-Γ^2)$, eddy flux ratio $γ=1/(1+Γ)$, and eddy diffusivity ratio $R_k=1-Γ$ are simply dependent on the dispassion ratio gamma Γ. We apply these relations to the measurement data in the western tropical Atlantic Ocean. The effective diapycnal diffusivity is $0.96*10^{-4} m^2/s$ that agrees quite well with the observation from 0.8 to $0.9*10^{-4} m^2/s$ by tracer.