On the two-dimensional extension of one-dimensional algebraically growing waves at neutral stability

Abstract

This work considers two linear operators which yield wave modes that are classified as neutrally stable, yet have responses that grow or decay in time. Previously, King et al. (2016) and Huber et al. (2020) examined the one-dimensional (1D) wave propagation governed by these operators. Here, we extend the linear operators to two spatial dimensions (2D) and examine the resulting solutions. We find that the increase of dimension leads to long-time behaviour where the magnitude is reduced by a factor of t−12 from the 1D solutions. Thus, regions of the solution which grew algebraically as t12 in 1D now are algebraically neutral in 2D, whereas regions which decay (algebraically or exponentially) in 1D now decay more quickly in 2D. Additionally, we find that these two linear operators admit long-time solutions that are functions of the same similarity variable that contracts space and time.