After completion of the couse the student
- knows about the troposphere, the stratosphere, jets, meridional circulations, propagating, stationary and breaking large scale waves, fronts and cyclonic and anticyclonic circulations,
- knows about “weather systems”, such as cumulus clouds, thunderstorms, sea breeze circulations, the Hadley circulation, tropical cyclones, fronts and precipitation systems in middle latitudes,
- knows about the role of water in the atmosphere.
- is acquainted with the variables and associated equations, used to describe the physical state of the atmosphere.
- is acquainted with theoretical concepts such potential temperature, equivalent potential temperature, hydrostatic balance, geostrophic balance, thermal wind balance, hydrostatic-, inertial- and baroclinic-instability, isentropic density, potential vorticity, potential vorticity inversion and frontogenesis.
- is acquainted with the quasi-geostrophic approximation and is able to apply this approximation to understand Rossby waves, vertical motion due to frontogenesis and to interpret the life-cycle of middle-latitude cyclones.
- can understand what the technique of potential vorticity inversion tells us about the structure of balanced cyclonic and anticyclonic circulations.
- understands the reasons for meridional transfer of mass due to large-scale geophysical turbulence.
- is able to analyse the structure of the atmosphere using large re-analysis data sets.
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Introduction into the theory of motions associated with weather systems in the atmosphere. The principal processes that will be discussed are wave motions associated with compressibility, gravity and rotation, motions associated with adjustment to hydrostatic, geostrophic and thermal wind balance and motions associated with hydrodynamic instability. Potential vorticity and frontogenesis are central concepts. Examples of weather systems that will be discussed are seabreeze circulations, thunderstorms, fronts and cyclones.
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