Vortex shedding in rotating flows

The tow facility presently employed to substantially extend the velocity (and therefore, Reynolds number) range of the flow channel used in the Boyer and Davies (1982) studies can simulate the beta effect, and may be applicable to rotating and stratified, multilayer or continuous fluids. The facility is used for the study of eddy shedding in the flow past right circular cylinders on an f-plane. For sufficiently large Reynolds numbers and sufficiently small aspect ratios, the Strouhal number is larger for larger rotation rates. Ekman suction plays an important role in the dissipation of vorticity in rotating systems for the range of parameters presently considered.