Comprehensive Exam - Gus Tropea

Presented by Gus Tropea
Computing PhD, Computational Math, Science and Engineering emphasis

Hybrid Presentation: Attend in-person in Mathematics 139 or online via Zoom

Numerical Simulation of the Atmospheric Lamb Waves Generated by the Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha’apai Eruption using a Shallow Water Approximation

Abstract: On January 15, 2022, around 04:05 UTC, the undersea volcano Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha’apai located near the South Pacific island of Tonga violently erupted, and a large amount of energy was released into the atmosphere. The atmospheric disturbances generated by this event were detected by equipment all around the world. Analysis of this data revealed that some of these atmospheric disturbances were Lamb waves generated by the volcanic eruption. Previous works have successfully modeled these types of waves by using a shallow water approximation. In this talk I will present results for the homogeneous shallow water equations at earth scale using high resolution finite volume methods and adaptive mesh refinement. I will also present a model for the source terms needed for the shallow water approximation of the Lamb waves generated by the Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha’apai eruption.

Committee:   Dr. Donna Calhoun, Dr. Grady Wright, Dr. Michal Kopera