UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN DIEGO Properties of nonlinear and breaking deep-water surface waves A dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree Doctor of Philosophy in Oceanography by Nicholas Edward Pizzo Committee in charge: W. Kendall Melville, Chair Robert Guza Richard Salmon Sutanu Sarkar Jerome Smith 2015 Copyright Nicholas Edward Pizzo, 2015 All rights reserved. The dissertation of Nicholas Edward Pizzo is approved, and it is acceptable in quality and form for publication on microfilm and electronically: Chair University of California, San Diego 2015 iii EPIGRAPH \When I heard the learn'd astronomer, When the proofs, the figures, were ranged in columns before me, When I was shown the charts and diagrams, to add, divide, and measure them, When I sitting heard the astronomer where he lectured with much applause in the lecture-room, How soon unaccountable I became tired and sick, Till rising and gliding out I wander'd off by myself, In the mystical moist night-air, and from time to time, Look'd up in perfect silence at the stars." |Walt Whitman iv TABLE OF CONTENTS Signature Page . iii Epigraph . iv Table of Contents . .v List of Figures . viii List of Tables . xi Acknowledgements . xii Vita........................................ xiii Abstract of the Dissertation . xiv 1 Introduction . .1 2 Vortex generation by deep-water wave breaking . .5 2.1 Introduction . .5 2.2 The breaking circulation model . 11 2.2.1 Governing equations . 11 2.2.2 Vortex generation . 16 2.3 Circulation of breaking waves . 19 2.3.1 Scaling of circulation . 19 Scaling based on dynamical considerations . 20 Plunging breaking waves . 22 Spilling breaking waves . 25 2.3.2 Comparison with laboratory studies . 27 2.4 Discussion . 29 3 Current generation by deep-water breaking waves . 33 3.1 Introduction . 33 3.2 The impulse and energy in the post breaking mean flow . 36 3.2.1 Properties of the flow induced by breaking . 36 3.2.2 Partitioning of the energy of the flow induced by breaking . 40 3.3 DNS of breaking waves . 42 3.3.1 Numerical experiment . 42 3.3.2 Energy dissipated by breaking, circulation and mean currents 47 3.4 Discussion . 49 v 4 Wave modulation: the geometry, kinematics, and dynamics of surface- wave focusing . 52 4.1 Introduction . 52 4.2 Modified nonlinear Schrodinger equation and its variational structure 56 4.2.1 The spatial MNLSE . 56 4.2.2 Variational formulation . 58 4.2.3 Conserved quantities . 59 4.3 Evolution of the moments of the spatial MNLSE . 61 4.3.1 Evolution of the centroid of the linear energy density . 62 4.3.2 Evolution of the variance for the spatial MNLSE . 64 4.4 Numerical experiments: Numerical schemes and initial conditions for focusing packets . 66 4.4.1 Numerical Schemes . 66 4.4.2 Initial conditions . 67 4.5 Results . 70 4.5.1 General features of the focusing wave group . 71 4.5.2 The kinematics of a focusing wave packet . 74 4.5.3 Evolution of the variance of the wave packet . 76 4.6 Discussion . 78 4.7 Conclusion . 81 4.8 Supplementary material . 82 4.8.1 Derivation of the spatial MNLSE based on Whitham's method 82 4.8.2 Linear theory of dispersive focusing wave packets . 86 A A Lagrangian for deep-water waves . 89 A.1 Introduction . 89 A.1.1 A review of the variational principle applied to water waves 91 A.2 Derivation of the equations of Balk . 93 A.3 Development for numerical implementation . 99 A.3.1 The equations of motion . 101 A.4 Special cases . 103 A.4.1 Linear waves . 104 A.4.2 Stokes Waves . 104 A.5 The case N =1............................. 106 A.5.1 Perturbations to the equilibrium states . 110 A.6 Overturning surface gravity wave . 111 A.7 Future work . 112 B A Virial theorem for deep-water surface gravity waves . 117 B.1 Second order Stokes waves . 120 vi C Variational form of the variance identity and the Benjamin-Feir Instability123 C.1 Introduction . 123 C.2 Variance identity of periodic waves governed by the nonlinear Schrodinger equation . 124 C.3 The variational method and the Benjamin-Feir instability . 126 References . 128 vii LIST OF FIGURES Figure 2.1: Analysis of laboratory measurements, adapted from Romero et al. (2012), of the breaking parameter b versus the maximum linear slope at breaking, S, as defined in equation (1.2). See Romero et al. (2012) for more details. .6 Figure 2.2: Laboratory measurements of the ensemble averaged, non- dimensionalized, velocity field induced by breaking, from Melville et al. (2002: MVW). See MVW for further details. .8 Figure 2.3: Impulse due to the body force parametrizing a breaking event. Based on forcing given in SMM2004, which is in the x^ direction.9 Figure 2.4: Description, proposed by Peregrine (1999), of the topological shape (a half vortex ring) of the flow shortly after a breaking event. The surface of the torus denotes the vortex filament and the arrows indicate the direction of the velocity. 10 Figure 2.5: Sketch of a thin elliptical half disk of major axis length 2A and minor axis length 2B being forced from rest to a velocity U^x through a fluid with surface at z = 0. z < 0 corresponds to water while z > 0 corresponds to air. 18 Figure 2.6: Schematic of (a) the geometry of a plunging breaker, (b) a video frame of a plunging breaking wave as the toe connects with the surface, and (c) a spilling breaker. See the text for details. Here, a and h represent the amplitude and height of the breaking wave. 23 Figure 2.7: Comparison of normalized circulation versus maximum linear slope at breaking S for the available laboratory data, which includes both spilling and plunging breaking waves. The sources of data in the legend are explained in Table 2.1. 30 Figure 3.1: A schematic of the focusing wave groups considered in this chap- ter, from Rapp and Melville (1990). The incident wave group, I, focuses at F, radiating, R, and transmitting, T, waves away from this region. 35 Figure 3.2: A sketch of the bulk scale effects of deep-water breaking on the water column. We assume that breaking acts like a thin impulsively-forced disk of semi-major axis A and semi-minor axis B, being forced from rest to a speed U along the x direction. 36 Figure 3.3: Time evolution of a plunging breaker with the vorticity field ∗ Ω = Ω=!0 at different time steps. The wave starts at the left of the numerical domain, propagates to the right, and breaks after half a period of propagation. 43 viii Figure 3.4: The normalized vorticity field Ω∗ remaining in the region of breaking for a plunging breaker. The post breaking flow is char- acterized by a compact region of vorticity, outside of which the flow is largely irrotational. 46 Figure 3.5: Circulation generated by the breaking event Γ (normalized by 3 c0=g) as a function of S. Solid line is the model from Pizzo and 3 Melville (2013) fitted to experimental data, Γg=c0 = γ0(S − 3=2 S0) , where γ0 = 0:98 and S0 = 0:08. 48 Figure 4.1: Initial conditions for a focusing wave packet with S = ∆ = 0:1; f0 = 1:0 Hz. Longer faster waves are put in after shorter slower waves, with constant phase parameters chosen such that the waves meet at a point in space and time. 70 Figure 4.2: The evolution of a focusing wave packet with S = ∆ = 0:1. The free surface evolution from the fully-nonlinear potential flow (DP) simulation is shown in dark blue, while the wave envelope from the MNLSE simulation is in red. 72 Figure 4.3: The evolution of the modulus of the wave envelope, jAj, in (χ, τ) coordinates. As the packet focuses, the envelope becomes asym- metric with the face at larger τ leaning forward. 74 Figure 4.4: The evolution of the (normalized) speed of the centroid of the potential flow theory (blue) and the MNLSE (red), versus down- stream position, for the locations shown in Figure 4.2, compared to theoretical model U, shown by the solid red line. 75 Figure 4.5: The evolution of the (normalized) variance of the wave packet governed by the MNLSE (red) and the full potential flow equa- tions (blue triangles), the later of which is shown at the locations where the free surface is displayed in Figure 4.2. 77 Figure 4.6: Ixx, as well as the terms that govern its evolution (see equa- tion 4.39). We see that the motion of this second derivative (dashed black line) is a balance between the tendency towards localization, during focusing and the resistance to this focusing. 78 Figure 4.7: An x-t diagram of a broadband focusing wave packet with S = 0:25, ∆ = 0:75, and fo = 0:82 Hz, which is outside of the region of validity of the MNLSE. The characteristic features of the focusing event are captured by the MNLSE. 80 Figure A.1: Permanent progressive wave solutions to the N = 1 system of equations, for several values of α0. The limiting form of the surface profile takes the form of a cycloid. 109 Figure A.2: The total energy T + V as a function of the coefficient α0. We see that the relationship is not monotonic and the maximum p energy occurs at α0 = 2=3. ................... 109 ix Figure A.3: Evolution of a permanent progressive wave with α0 = 0:75.