Comparison of structure function and detrended fluctuation analysis of wind time series

A multifractal (MF) analysis in time scale has been applied to three wind speed series presenting a different pattern. The temporal scaling properties of the records, registered each 10 minutes, were studied using two different methods, structure function (SF) and detrended fluctuation analysis (DFA), to establish a comparison of the results and their interpretation in the geostrophic turbulence context. A systematic analysis of the exponent of the structure function (zeta(q)) and the generalized Hurst exponents (H(q)) gave, in general terms, equivalent results when a comparison is applied among the three months. However MF DFA presented statistically more robust results. This allowed us to see a clear difference between the parameters studied for each month: linear component of zeta(q) (zeta(q = 1) = H), intermittency of the wind series (mu), deviation from linear structure function (lambda), Hurst exponent (H(q = 2)) and H(q) dependence on q (Delta H).