A survey of Saturn''s Northern Hemisphere from 1979 to 1987

A photographic survey in four spectral regions (ultraviolet, blue, visible and red) of the Northern Hemisphere of Saturn's atmosphere, has been carried out between 1980 (epoch of the edgewise apparition of the rings) and 1987 (ring's maximum aperture), with the aim of analyzing the changes in the cloud morphology and reflectivity with respect to the spacecraft aspects in 1979 (Pioneer 11) and 1980–1981 (Voyager 1 and 2). Very few variations were detected in the meridional position of the belts and zones ; only a shift of 4000 km toward the North appeared to occur in 1984 in ultraviolet light to the region at latitude 46°N (occupied in 1980–1981 by the “ribbon” feature). Other belts and zones remained stable to ground-based telescopic resolution during the whole period. An increase of 7% in the reflectivity ratio of the belt NEB and the zone EZ, was noted in the spectral interval from 4000 to 6500 Å last year. This can be attributed to the seasonal insolation variation.     

Non-uniform propagation of weak waves through thermally-conducting and dissociating gases

Non-uniform propagation of weak discontinuities headed by wavefronts of arbitrary shape along bi-characteristics of a hyperbolic system through thermally-conducting and dissociating gases are studied. An explicit criterion for the growth and decay of weak waves along bi-characteristic curves in the characteristic manifold of the governing differential equations is given. The two fundamental theorems on the global behaviour of the time-dependent wave amplitude of a weak wave has been concluded.     

Surface heat fluxes and subsurface heat content at a site over the southeastern Bering Sea shelf, May–July 1996

Observations from a surface mooring, in a weak-flow regime over the southeastern Bering Sea shelf, were used to derive surface heat fluxes for the period May–July 1996. Changes in heat content of the water column also were determined from subsurface temperature measurements. Agreement of net surface heat flux and change in heat content was within 2%. This result provides additional evidence that heat advection and diffusion are small in this region.     

The motion of a 9.1 m yacht hull buoy moored in open sea

A 9.1 m yacht hull was instrumented to measure its three-dimensional motion when moored in the open sea. The hull was deployed on three occasions for a total period of about 2 months and encountered a wide range of wind-wave conditions including a strong gale. The data have been analysed to give the response for each component of motion in terms of amplitude and relative phases. The hull motion is compared spectrally to the waves observed by a nearby Waverider. The hull was found to behave as a surface-keyed buoy, with a well defined response for a wide range of conditions. The presence of a resonance in pitch and roll is evident in the data with typical rms values being 5° and 10°, respectively, for significant wave height of 5 m. From data on the mooring dynamics it is concluded that the peaks observed in the tension are a result of the viscous drag opposing the change in the catenary of the mooring and the slow drift oscillations of the buoy. This type of hull is a versatile and economical candidate as a platform for meteorological and oceanographic instrumentation.     

Linear spin-up in a sliced cylinder

Abstract

spin-up and spin-down in a circular tank with a uniformly sloping bottom are studied experimentally and numerically for small values of the relative change in the angular velocity of the tank. Generally, the initial single-cell flow evolves into a number of smaller vortices. The evolution is compared with an analytical model based on an expansion of the flow field in linear Rossby waves (Pedlosky and Greenspan, 1967). Although it is possible to tune the experimental parameters in such a way that agreement with the theory is found, in most cases the experiments show shedding of vortices in the initial stage of the spin-up or spin-down, a phenomenon not described by the analytical model. Nonetheless, in such cases the analytical model still accounts for other observations: the alternating generation of cyclonic and anticyclonic vortices in the eastern part of the tank and their subsequent westward motion.     

Probabilistic calibration of a distributed hydrological model for flood forecasting

Abstract

The complexity of distributed hydrological models has led to improvements in calibration methodologies in recent years. There are various manual, automatic and hybrid methods of calibration. Most use a single objective function to calculate estimation errors. The use of multi-objective calibration improves results, since different aspects of the hydrograph may be considered simultaneously. However, the uncertainty of estimates from a hydrological model can only be taken into account by using a probabilistic approach. This paper presents a calibration method of probabilistic nature, based on the determination of probability functions that best characterize different parameters of the model. The method was applied to the Real-time Interactive Basin Simulator (RIBS) distributed hydrological model using the Manzanares River basin in Spain as a case study. The proposed method allows us to consider the uncertainty in the model estimates by obtaining the probability distributions of flows in the flood hydrograph.

Citation Mediero, L., Garrote, L. & Martín-Carrasco, F. J. (2011) Probabilistic calibration of a distributed hydrological model for flood forecasting. Hydrol. Sci. J. 56(7), 1129–1149.