Articles | Volume 27, issue 2
https://doi.org/10.5194/npg-27-147-2020
https://doi.org/10.5194/npg-27-147-2020
Review article
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03 Apr 2020
Review article | Highlight paper |  | 03 Apr 2020

Baroclinic and barotropic instabilities in planetary atmospheres: energetics, equilibration and adjustment

Peter Read, Daniel Kennedy, Neil Lewis, Hélène Scolan, Fachreddin Tabataba-Vakili, Yixiong Wang, Susie Wright, and Roland Young

Related subject area

Subject: Bifurcation, dynamical systems, chaos, phase transition, nonlinear waves, pattern formation | Topic: Climate, atmosphere, ocean, hydrology, cryosphere, biosphere | Techniques: Theory
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Cited articles

Aguiar, A. C. B., Read, P. L., Wordsworth, R. D., Salter, T., and Yamazaki, Y. H.: A laboratory model of Saturn's North Polar Hexagon, Icarus, 206, 755–763, 2010. a, b, c
Anderson, J. D. and Schubert, G.: Saturn's gravitational field, internal rotation, and interior structure, Science, 317, 1384–1387, 2007. a
Andrews, D. G.: On the existence of nonzonal flows satisfying sufficient conditions for stability, Geophys. Astrophys. Fluid Dyn., 28, 243–256, 1984a. a
Andrews, D. G.: On the stability of forced non-zonal flows, Q. J. Roy. Meteor. Soc., 110, 657–662, 1984b. a
Antuñano, A., del Río‐Gaztelurrutia, T. and. Sánchez‐Lavega, A., Read, P. L., and Fletcher, L. N.: Potential Vorticity of Saturn's Polar Regions: Seasonality and Instabilities, J. Geophys. Res., 124, 186–201, https://doi.org/10.1029/2018JE005764, 2019. a
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Short summary
Baroclinic and barotropic instabilities are well known as the processes responsible for the production of the most important energy-containing eddies in the atmospheres and oceans of Earth and other planets. Linear and nonlinear instability theories provide insights into when such instabilities may occur, grow to a large amplitude and saturate, with examples from the laboratory, simplified numerical models and planetary atmospheres. We conclude with a number of open issues for future research.