Analytical study of a generalised Dirichlet–Neumann operator and application to three-dimensional water waves on Beltrami flows

Abstract

We consider three-dimensional doubly periodic steady water waves with vorticity, under the action of gravity and surface tension; in particular we consider so-called Beltrami flows, for which the velocity field and the vorticity are collinear. We adapt a recent formulation of the corresponding problem for localised waves which involves a generalisation of the classical Dirichlet–Neumann operator. We study this operator in detail, extending some well-known results for the classical Dirichlet–Neumann operator, such as the Taylor expansion in homogeneous powers of the wave profile, the computation of its differential and the asymptotic expansion of its associated symbol. A new formulation of the problem as a single equation for the wave profile is also presented and discussed in a similar vein. As an application of these results we prove existence of doubly periodic gravity-capillary steady waves and construct approximate doubly periodic gravity steady waves.