Eastward and westward traveling waves were observed by the Nimbus 7 Limb Infrared Monitor of the Stratosphere (LIMS) during the northern winter 1978--1979. Eastward waves were prevalent in early winter and were involved in a minor Canadian warming in December 1978. A large westward traveling wave, as described by previous authors, was observed in January 1979 during a series of minor warmings. By comparing these two events, it is shown that in both cases the superposition of traveling and quasi-stationary waves led to constructive interference that was responsible for the warmings. However, there was significant asymmetry between eastward and westward traveling components. Eastward disturbances were confined mostly within the polar vortex, whereas quasi-stationary and westward traveling components propagated to the vortex periphery and beyond, into the tropics and mid-latitude mesosphere. This behavior is consistent with Rossby wave propagation and indicates that the location and magnitude of planetary wave breaking is sensitive to the frequency spectrum entering the middle atmosphere. However, this asymmetry is also a signature of the nonlinear critical layer as it projects onto the frequency spectrum. Both interpretations are shown to be valid during wave events observed by LIMS. A local Eulerian analysis of potential vorticity (PV) transport indicates that adiabatic, geostrophic advection by the resolvable scales of motion explains qualitatively (but not quantitatively) the observed potential vorticity tendencies in the LIMS northern hemisphere winter. In particular, calculated advection explains the eastward rotation of the main vortex, intrusion of low PV air into the polar cap, and formation of high PV filaments at the vortex periphery. ¿1991 American Geophysical Union