A regime diagram for classifying turbulent large eddies in the upper ocean

Turbulence in the wind-driven upper ocean shows a transition from shear to Langmuir turbulence as Lat decreases. A fully-developed sea state corresponds to Lat≈0.3 and lies within the Langmuir regime. Vertical turbulence intensity in Langmuir turbulence is about two times larger than that in shear turbulence and falls into the range observed in the upper ocean. Hence the wind-driven upper ocean will be dominated by Langmuir turbulence under typical sea state conditions. Transition from Langmuir to convective turbulence occurs around Ho=O(1), which is much greater than Ho=O(0.01) obtained using typical heat fluxes and wind speeds.