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🌊 Langmuir Circulation: Wind-Driven Ocean Windrows

See how wind stress and wave-driven Stokes drift combine to create Langmuir circulation, the paired helical vortices that organize floating debris and foam into the parallel windrows visible on windy seas.

Climate, Ecology & Environment3DModerate60 FPS💧 Water 💨 Air & Wind

The simulation demonstrates how wind stress combines with wave-driven Stokes drift to generate counter-rotating Langmuir vortex pairs that sweep floating debris into parallel surface windrows.

🔬 What It Demonstrates

The simulation demonstrates how wind stress combines with wave-driven Stokes drift to generate counter-rotating Langmuir vortex pairs that sweep floating debris into parallel surface windrows.

🎮 How to Use

Adjust the wind stress and Stokes drift sliders to change the strength and spacing of the vortex pairs, and watch how floating particles are swept into windrow convergence lines.

💡 Did You Know?

Langmuir circulation is named after Nobel laureate Irving Langmuir, who first described it systematically after noticing floating seaweed organized into parallel lines while crossing the Sargasso Sea in 1927.

⚙ Under the hood

langmuir circulationocean windrowsstokes driftwind stresssurface vorticesupper ocean mixingcraik-leibovichsea surface

3D · Three.js / WebGL renderer · 60 FPS target · runs fully client-side, no install