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Updated: May 18, 2026

An Analog Macroscopic Technique for Studying Molecular Hydrodynamic Processes in Dense Gases and Liquids
Published on: December 4, 2017
Incompressible wave motion of compressible fluids
1CIRES, University of Colorado and NOAA Earth System Research Laboratory, Physical Sciences Division, Boulder, Colorado 80305, USA. Oleg.Godin@noaa.gov
Abstract:
We consider linear waves in compressible fluids in a uniform potential field, such as a gravity field, and demonstrate that a particular type of wave motion, in which pressure remains constant in each fluid parcel, is supported by inhomogeneous fluids occupying bounded or unbounded domains. We present elementary, exact solutions of linearized hydrodynamics equations, which describe the new type of waves in the coupled ocean-atmosphere system. The solutions provide an extension of surface gravity waves in an incompressible fluid half-space with a free boundary to waves in compressible, three-dimensionally inhomogeneous, rotating fluids.
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