title: Shape of fair weather clouds.
abstract: We introduce a model which accounts for the shape of cumulus clouds exclusively in terms of thermal plumes or thermals. The plumes are explicitly represented by a simple potential flow generated by singularities (sources and sinks) and are thus laminar, but with their motion create a field which supports the cloud. We compare this model with actual clouds by means of various shape descriptors including the fractal dimension, and find agreement.
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of California Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California 90095-1547, USA.
authors.forename: Yong
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.forename: Giovanni
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Zocchi