Accelerating Atmospheric Gravity Wave Simulations Using Machine Learning: Kelvin-Helmholtz Instability and Mountain Wave Sources Driving Gravity Wave Breaking and Secondary Gravity Wave Generation

Gravity waves (GWs) and their associated multi-scale dynamics are known to play fundamental roles in energy and momentum transport and deposition processes throughout the atmosphere. We describe an initial machine learning model—the Compressible Atmosphere Model Network (CAM-Net). CAM-Net is trained on high-resolution simulations by the state-of-the-art model Complex Geometry Compressible Atmosphere Model (CGCAM). Two initial applications to a Kelvin-Helmholtz instability source and mountain wave generation, propagation, breaking, and Secondary GW (SGW) generation in two wind environments are described here. Results show that CAM-Net can capture the key 2-D dynamics modeled by CGCAM with high precision. Spectral characteristics of primary and SGWs estimated by CAM-Net agree well with those from CGCAM. Our results show that CAM-Net can achieve a several order-of-magnitude acceleration relative to CGCAM without sacrificing accuracy and suggests a potential for machine learning to enable efficient and accurate descriptions of primary and secondary GWs in global atmospheric models.