Three-dimensional instabilities of nonlinear gravity-capillary waves

Linear three-dimensional instabilities of nonlinear two-dimensional uniform gravitycapillary waves are studied using numerical methods. The eigenvalue system for the stability problem is generated using a Galerkin method and differs in detail from techniques used to study the stability of pure gravity waves (McLean 1982) and pure capillary waves (Chen & Saffman 1985). It is found that instabilities develop in the neighbourhood of the linear (triad, quartet and quintet) resonance curves. Further, both sum and difference triad ressonances are unstable for sufficiently steep waves in consequence of which Hasselmann’s (1967) theorem is restricted to weakly nonlinear waves. The appearance of a superharmonic two-dimensional instability and bifurcation to three-dimensional waves are noted.