Vortices in rotating systems: Centrifugal, elliptic and hyperbolic type instabilities

This paper is devoted to the effects of rotation on the linear dynamics of two-dimensional vortices. The asymmetric behavior of cyclones and anticyclones, a basic problem with respect to the dynamics of rotating flows, is particularly addressed. This problem is investigated by means of linear stability analyses of flattened Taylor–Green vortices in a rotating system. This flow constitutes an infinite array of contra-rotating one-signed nonaxisymmetric vorticity structures. We address the stability of this flow with respect to three-dimensional short-wave perturbations via both the geometrical optics method and via a classical normal mode analysis, based on a matrix eigenvalue method. From a physical point of view, we show that vortices are affected by elliptic, hyperbolic and centrifugal instabilities. A complete picture of the short-wave stability properties of the flow is given for various levels of the background rotation. For Taylor–Green cells with aspect ratio E=2, we show that anticyclones undergo centrifugal instability if the Rossby number verifies Ro>1, elliptic instability for all values of Ro except 0.75