Slow magnetic Rossby waves in the Earth's core

Abstract

The westward drift component of the secular variation is likely to be a signal of waves riding on a background mean flow. By separating the wave and mean flow contributions, we can infer the strength of the "hidden" azimuthal part of the magnetic field within the core. We explore the origin of the westward drift commonly seen in dynamo simulations and show that it propagates at the speed of the slow magnetic Rossby waves with respect to a mean zonal flow. Our results indicate that such waves could be excited in the Earth's core and that wave propagation may indeed play some role in the longitudinal drift, particularly at higher latitudes where the wave component is relatively strong, the equatorial westward drift being dominated by the mean flow. We discuss a potential inference of the RMS toroidal field strength within the Earth's core from the observed drift rate.