Point vortices on the sphere: stability of symmetric relative equilibria (Q420294)

Point vortex systems on the sphere were introduced by \textit{V. A. Bogomolov} [Fluid Dyn. 12(1977), 863--870 (1978); translation from Izv. Akad. Nauk SSSR, Mekh. Zhidk. Gaza 1977, No. 6, 57--65 (1977; Zbl 0442.76020)], who presented simple models for the dynamics of concentrated regions of vorticity (such as cyclones and hurricanes in planetary atmospheres). In this article the authors consider a non-rotating sphere, since the sphere rotation induces a nonuniform background vorticity making the whole system infinite-dimensional. Similarly to the planar case the equations governing the motion of \(N\) point vortices on a sphere are Hamiltonian. The authors study stability of \(N\) point vortices relative equilibria (RE) using the symmetry of the system and the presence of isotropy subgroups of the RE. The appropriate concept for RE of Hamiltonian system stability is Lyapounov stability modulo a subgroup, which is realized at the usage of the energy-momentum method as computing the eigenvalues of a certain Hessian and leads to nonlinear stability results, and also by computing the eigenvalues of the linearization of the equations of motion that leads to linear stability results. In the subsequent sections the authors study the different types of RE consisting of a single ring of identical vortices (configuration \(C_{nv}(R)\)) and configurations formed by two rings of arbitrary vorticities (\(C_{nv}(2R)\) and \(C_{nv}(R, R')\), respectively) for various \(n\). Group invariance bifurcation theory is applied.