Planetary Climate Dynamics

Abstract:

This paper considers the rationale for the exploration of Saturn's atmosphere by the Cassini mission, taking account of the key scientific questions posed by the earlier investigation by Voyager, and the capabilities of the instrumentation making up the Cassini payload. While by no means all objectives can be addressed by this particular configuration, in particular without a Saturn entry probe, if everything goes according to plan important progress should be possible on a number of key objectives. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.

Abstract:

The relative merits of three contrasting empirical orthogonal decomposition methods in common use (namely, Proper Orthogonal Decomposition, Biorthogonal Decomposition and Multivariate Singular Systems Analysis) are considered as applied to baroclinic flow data. The regimes analysed are a steady, drifting wave, a modulated amplitude vacillating wave flow and a neighbouring multi-mode state which exhibits intermittency. The results are used to make a qualitative comparison of the methods in terms of convergence properties, variance capture and eigenfunction structure. The feasibility of using the resulting empirical orthogonal functions to transform partial differential equations to ordinary differential equations by Galerkin projection is mentioned. © 1997 Elsevier Science B.V.