Stability Analysis of Numerical Methods for a 1.5-Layer Shallow-Water Ocean Model

A 1.5-layer reduced-gravity shallow-water ocean model in spherical coordinates is described and discretized in a staggered grid (standard Arakawa C-grid) with the forward-time central-space (FTCS) method and the Leap-frog finite difference scheme. The discrete Fourier analysis method combined with t...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Guang-an Zou, Bo Wang, Mu Mu
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Hindawi Limited 2013-01-01
Series:Journal of Applied Mathematics
Online Access:http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2013/478054
Description
Summary:A 1.5-layer reduced-gravity shallow-water ocean model in spherical coordinates is described and discretized in a staggered grid (standard Arakawa C-grid) with the forward-time central-space (FTCS) method and the Leap-frog finite difference scheme. The discrete Fourier analysis method combined with the Gershgorin circle theorem is used to study the stability of these two finite difference numerical models. A series of necessary conditions of selection criteria for the time-space step sizes and model parameters are obtained. It is showed that these stability conditions are more accurate than the Courant-Friedrichs-Lewy (CFL) condition and other two criterions (Blumberg and Mellor, 1987; Casulli, 1990, 1992). Numerical experiments are proposed to test our stability results, and numerical model that is designed is also used to simulate the ocean current.
ISSN:1110-757X
1687-0042