Nonlinear Oscillations of Semigeostrophic Eady Waves in the Presence of Diffusivity

Analyses are performed to examine the physical processes involved in nonlinear oscillations of Eady baroclinic waves obtained from viscous semigeostrophic models with two types of boundary conditions (freeslip and non-slip). By comparing with previous studies for the case of the free-slip boundary condition, it is shown that the nonlinear oscillations are produced mainly by the interaction between the baroclinic wave and zonal-mean state (total zonal-mean flow velocity and buoyancy stratification) but the timescale of the nonlinear oscillations is largely controlled by the diffusivity. When the boundary condition is non-slip, the nonlinear oscillations are further damped and slowed by the diffusive process. Since the free-slip (non-slip)boundary condition is the zero drag (infinite drag) limit of the more realistic drag boundary condition,the nonlinear oscillations obtained with the two types of boundary conditions are two extremes for more realistic nonlinear oscillations.