Wind-wave amplification mechanisms: possible models for steep wave events in finite depth

We extend the Miles mechanism of wind-wave generation to finite depth. A beta-Miles linear growth rate depending on the depth and wind velocity is derived and allows the study of linear growth rates of surface waves from weak to moderate winds in finite depth h. The evolution of beta is plotted, for several values of the dispersion parameter kh with k the wave number. For constant depths we find that no matter what the values of wind velocities are, at small enough wave age the beta-Miles linear growth rates are in the known deep-water limit. However winds of moderate intensities prevent the waves from growing beyond a critical wave age, which is also constrained by the water depth and is less than the wave age limit of deep water. Depending on wave age and wind velocity, the Jeffreys and Miles mechanisms are compared to determine which of them dominates. A wind-forced nonlinear Schrodinger equation is derived and the Akhmediev, Peregrine and Kuznetsov-Ma breather solutions for weak wind inputs in finite depth h are obtained.

Search for gravitational wave ringdowns from perturbed intermediate mass black holes in LIGO-Virgo data from 2005-2010

We report results from a search for gravitational waves produced by perturbed intermediate mass black holes ( IMBH) in data collected by LIGO and Virgo between 2005 and 2010. The search was sensitive to astrophysical sources that produced damped sinusoid gravitational wave signals, also known as ringdowns, with frequency 50 <= f(0)/Hz <= 2000 and decay timescale 0.0001 less than or similar to tau/s less than or similar to 0.1 characteristic of those produced in mergers of IMBH pairs. No significant gravitational wave candidate was detected. We report upper limits on the astrophysical coalescence rates of IMBHs with total binary mass 50 <= M/ M circle dot <= 450 and component mass ratios of either 1: 1 or 4: 1. For systems with total mass 100 <= M/M circle dot <= 150, we report a 90% confidence upper limit on the rate of binary IMBH mergers with nonspinning and equal mass components of 6.9 x 10(-8) Mpc(-3) yr(-1). We also report a rate upper limit for ringdown waveforms from perturbed IMBHs, radiating 1% of their mass as gravitational waves in the fundamental, l = m = 2, oscillation mode, that is nearly three orders of magnitude more stringent than previous results.