The UM, a fully--compressible, non--hydrostatic, deep atmosphere GCM, applied to hot Jupiters
Abstract
We are adapting the Global Circulation Model (GCM) of the UK Met Office, the so--called Unified Model (UM), for the study of hot Jupiters. In this work we demonstrate the successful adaptation of the most sophisticated dynamical core, the component of the GCM which solves the equations of motion for the atmosphere, available within the UM, ENDGame (Even Newer Dynamics for General atmospheric modelling of the environment). Within the same numerical scheme ENDGame supports solution to the dynamical equations under varying degrees of simplification. We present results from a simple, shallow (in atmospheric domain) hot Jupiter model (SHJ), and a more realistic (with a deeper atmosphere) HD 209458b test case. For both test cases we find that the large--scale, time--averaged (over the 1200 days prescribed test period), dynamical state of the atmosphere is relatively insensitive to the level of simplification of the dynamical equations. However, problems exist when attempting to reproduce the results for these test cases derived from other models. For the SHJ case the lower (and upper) boundary intersects the dominant dynamical features of the atmosphere meaning the results are heavily dependent on the boundary conditions. For the HD 209458b test case, when using the more complete dynamical models, the atmosphere is still clearly evolving after 1200 days, and in a transient state. Solving the complete (deep atmosphere and non--hydrostatic) dynamical equations allows exchange between the vertical and horizontal momentum of the atmosphere, via Coriolis and metric terms. Subsequently, interaction between the upper atmosphere and the deeper more slowly evolving (radiatively inactive) atmosphere significantly alters the results, and acts over timescales longer than 1200 days.
Keywords
Cite
@article{arxiv.1311.2083,
title = {The UM, a fully--compressible, non--hydrostatic, deep atmosphere GCM, applied to hot Jupiters},
author = {N. J. Mayne and I. Baraffe and David M. Acreman and Chris Smith and Matthew K. Browning and David Skålid Amundsen and Nigel Wood and John Thuburn and David R. Jackson},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1311.2083},
year = {2016}
}
Comments
24 pages, 11 figures. Accepted for publication in Astronomy and Astrophysics