Geophysical Fluid Dynamics

The material in this book is based predominantly on my recent work. It is the first monograph on the subject, though some support material may overlap other monographs. The investigation of wave packets and their bi­ furcations is very interesting, and useful theoretically and in practice, not only in geophysical fluid dynamics, which is the field to which the theory is being applied here, but also in other fields in mathematics and the natural sciences.

The material in this book is based predominantly on my recent work. It is the first monograph on the subject, though some support material may overlap other monographs. The investigation of wave packets and their bi­ furcations is very interesting, and useful theoretically and in practice, not only in geophysical fluid dynamics, which is the field to which the theory is being applied here, but also in other fields in mathematics and the natural sciences.

The vigorous stirring of a cup of tea gives rise, as we all know, to interesting fluid dynamical phenomena, some of which are very hard to explain. In this book our "cup of tea" contains the currents of the Earth's atmosphere, oceans, mantle, and fluid core. Our goal is to under­ stand the basic physical processes which are most important in describing what we observe, directly or indirectly, in these complex systems.

The vigorous stirring of a cup of tea gives rise, as we all know, to interesting fluid dynamical phenomena, some of which are very hard to explain. In this book our "cup of tea" contains the currents of the Earth's atmosphere, oceans, mantle, and fluid core. Our goal is to under­ stand the basic physical processes which are most important in describing what we observe, directly or indirectly, in these complex systems.

This book describes the derivation of the equations of motion of fluids as well as the dynamics of ocean and atmospheric currents on both large and small scales through the use of variational methods. In this way the equations of Fluid and Geophysical Fluid Dynamics are re-derived making use of a unifying principle, that is Hamilton’s Principle of Least Action.