We begin with an experimental investigation of the flow induced in a rotating spherical shell. The shell globally rotates with angular velocity. A further periodic oscillation with angular velocity 0 ω 2 , a so-called longitudinal libration, is added on the inner sphere's rotation. The primary response is inertial waves spawned at the critical latitudes on the inner sphere, and propagating throughout the shell along inclined characteristics. For sufficiently large libration amplitudes, the higher harmonics also become important. Those harmonics whose frequencies are still less than 2 behave as inertial waves themselves, propagating along their own characteristics. The steady component of the flow consists of a prograde zonal jet on the cylinder tangent to the inner sphere and parallel to the axis of rotation, and increases with decreasing Ekman number. The jet becomes unstable for larger forcing amplitudes as can be deduced from the preliminary particle image velocimetry observations. Finally, a wave attractor is experimentally detected in the spherical shell as the pattern of largest variance. These findings are reproduced in a two-dimensional numerical investigation of the flow, and certain aspects can be studied numerically in greater detail. One aspect is the scaling of the width of the inertial shear layers and the width of the steady jet. Another is the partitioning of the kinetic energy between the forced wave, its harmonics and the mean flow. Finally, the numerical simulations allow for an investigation of instabilities, too local to be found experimentally. For strong libration amplitudes, the boundary layer on the inner sphere becomes unstable,

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Abstract. The spherical shell convection in the lower rotational regime is discussed with numerical simulation by the use of a pseudo-spectral code and experimental observation by the use of a microgravity experiment in self-gravitating force field. While a low Coriolis force produces traveling waves of cubic, five-fold and frozen tetrahedral symmetry with a prograde drift, in the transition zone to chaos an axisymmetric flow is visible. The chaotic fluid flow does neither show a specific drift nor a dominating pattern of convection. Numerical and experimental data are in a good agreement.