The scientific literature on baroclinic tides in the ocean is as abundant as is the general mathematical theory of internal gravity waves. The majority of research papers on this topic written since the late 1970s deal mainly with the attempts to provide a theoretical description of the vast number of experimental data obtained on the dynamics of baroclinic tides. Various analytical and semianalytical models were developed for the case of infinitesimal waves when the external tidal forcing is negligible. However, observations show that strong nonlinear baroclinic tides are the more common phenomena; they demand not only theoretical but also numerical methods to describe the wave processes adequately.

The idea of the book is to present the theoretical basis of baroclinic tides at all stages of their genesis and evolution (generation, transformation, dissipation), and to give, by comparison with experiments, advice and help regarding the theoretical interpretation and prognosis of baroclinic tides. Such an exhaustive and complete theoretical review does not exist at present, nor is there a scientific book which describes this phenomenon multilaterally. So we are intending to fill this gap.

A second reason for writing a book on this topic is to gather in one place our experience, which extends over more than 20 years, in investigating internal waves in general and baroclinic tides in particular.