Solution

ID: past-exam-of-the-mathematics-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2010/iii/paper-65/4/b/solution

To connect the prescribed interfacial drag coefficient to the energy supply, state the lumped interfacial power model for entrainment explicitly:
It estimates the power transmitted by lid-driven flow to the mixing interface. Constant geometric and transfer factors are included in or . It is the local stress-power interpretation required for the depth laws in this question, not an identity equating arbitrary lid shaft power to interfacial power. With the potential energy of two-layer entrainment from (a),
In model S, and are constant, so
Thus the depth increases at a constant rate proportional to the inverse bulk Richardson number, with , until the layer reaches . Here the prescribed must be read as a characteristic speed. Literal pure solid-body rotation has zero radial velocity, so the PDF's parenthetical description of as radial cannot simultaneously be a strict component statement and the assumption .
If the phrase about lid work is taken literally as shaft power , the interfacial stress alone does not specify the lid torque or its energy transfer to the interface. The preceding closure is therefore a visible model assumption, not a hidden consequence of solid-body rotation.

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