A Bifurcation Theory for Three-Dimensional Oblique Travelling Gravity-Capillary Water Waves

This article presents a rigorous existence theory for small-amplitude threedimensional travelling water waves. The hydrodynamic problem is formulated as an infinite-dimensional Hamiltonian system in which an arbitrary horizontal spatial direction is the timelike variable. Wave motions that are periodic in a second, different horizontal direction are detected using a centre-manifold reduction technique by which the problem is reduced to a locally equivalent Hamiltonian system with a finite number of degrees of freedom.