GEOPHYSICS: Atmosphere Drives Earth's Tipsiness

Science. 2000 Aug 4;289(5480):710. doi: 10.1126/science.289.5480.710.

Abstract

For more than a century, geophysicists who track Earth's rotation have sensed a rhythmic unsteadiness about the planet, an ever-so-slight wobbling whose source remained frustratingly mysterious. But researchers have been homing in on the roots of the so-called Chandler wobble, and now a report in the 1 August issue of Geophysical Research Letters fingers the shifting pressures of the deep sea and ultimately the fickle winds of the atmosphere.