Publications

Osborne, A.R., Resio, D.T., Costa, A., Ponce de Leon, S. and Chirivi, E. (2019), “Highly Nonlinear Wind Waves in Currituck Sound: Dense Breather Turbulence in Random Ocean Waves”, Ocean Dynamics, Vol. 69(2), pp. 187-219

We analyze surface wave data taken in Currituck Sound, North Carolina, during a storm on 4 February 2002. Our focus is on the application of nonlinear Fourier analysis (NLFA) methods (Osborne 2010) to analyze the data set: The approach spectrally decomposes a nonlinear wave field into sine waves, Stokes waves, and phase-locked Stokes waves otherwise known as breather trains. Breathers are nonlinear beats, or packets which “breathe” up and down smoothly over cycle times of minutes to hours. The maximum amplitudes of the packets during the cycle have a largest central wave whose properties are often associated with the study of “rogue waves.” The mathematical physics of the nonlinear Schr¨odinger (NLS) equation is assumed and the methods of algebraic geometry are applied to give the nonlinear spectral representation. The distinguishing characteristic of the NLFA method is its ability to spectrally decompose a time series into its nonlinear coherent structures (Stokes waves and breathers) rather than just sine waves. This is done by the implementation of multidimensional, quasiperiodic Fourier series, rather than ordinary Fourier series.

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