Atmospheric Physics

An understanding of the influence that aerosols have on climate has become increasingly important over the last several decades [3]. Primary and secondary aerosols can affect the Earth s radiative balance by scattering and absorbing light directly and can act indirectly as cloud condensation nuclei and therefore influence the distribution, duration, precipitation processes, and radiative properties of clouds. Thus, developing the ability to understand, model, and predict aerosol formation with confidence is essential to determine the impact of aerosol radiative forcing in climate models. 

The influence of aerosols on radiative forcing depends on the balance between three essential quantities single-scattering albedo, upscatter fraction, and optical depth—all are sensitive functions of the aerosol chemical composition and size distribution in the 0.1 to 1.0 pm range [1,14]. Aerosol climate forcing, AF, depends on geophysical and aerosol parameters and can be expressed as 

Estimating the indirect effect is difficult because the mechanisms underlying the chain of microphysical processes connecfing emissions with cloud albedo are uncertain—twice as uncertain as the direct effect as mentioned previously. Clouds form when an air parcel is cooled fhrough vertical liffing and the vapor becomes 

HGURE 20.5 Relevant processes (a) nucleation and grov th, (b) coagulation, and 

After a nucleation burst occurs, the aerosol population (fresh clusters and preexisting particles) evolves through coagulation, condensation, evaporation, emis- 

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Nucleation in a cloud chamber is an important experimental tool to understand nucleation processes. Such nucleation by ions can arise in atmospheric physics theoretical analysis has been made [62, 63] and there are interesting differences in the nucleating ability of positive and negative ions [64]. In water vapor, it appears that the full heat of solvation of an ion is approached after only 5-10 water molecules have associated with... 

The behavior of gases in air, as shown by studies in atmospheric physics and chemistry, depends on the physical and chemical properties of these gases, such as density and reactivity. Examples of gas and air densities are given in Table 13.20. 

Role of composition in atmospheric physical process. The composition of the atmosphere plays a distinct set of roles in controlling and affecting certain physical processes of the atmosphere, most notably the thermal structure. 

Table 16-2 presents what might be termed the minimum set of constituents that must be considered in the case of cloud/rainwater. If we consider the amount of water, L, to be fixed by atmospheric physical processes, the minimum number of input components that can vary are SO2, NH3, CO2, and whatever solute is present from the CCN, often one or another sulfate compound between H2SO4 and (NH4)2S04. Occasionally, salt particles from the ocean surface may be sufficiently abundant to provide enough solute to influence the pH via the inherent alkalinity of seawater, and we will consider that as a second, somewhat more complicated possibility. 

Fleagle, R. G. and Businger, J. A. (1963). "An Introduction to Atmospheric Physics." Academic Press, New York and London. 

Volume 25 Robert G. Fleagle and Joost A. Volume 42 Businger. An Introduction to Atmospheric Physics, Second Volume 43... 

Volume 61 Murry L. Salby. Fundamentals of Atmospheric Physics. 1996 Volume 62 James P. McCalpin. 

Salby, M.L., 1996. Fundamentals of Atmospheric Physics. Academic Press, New York, pp. 44 45. 

WANG MINGXING, REN LIXIN, and Lu WEIXIU Institute of Atmospheric Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences,... 

Measurements made during the second week, 16-21 March 1980, are especially relevant to the chemical characterization of air masses. During this period meteorological conditions can be summarized as follows, based on weather information from the Institute of Atmospheric Physics and twice daily surface and upper level weather maps published by the Japan Meteorological Agency. 

IAMAP, Terminology and Units of Radiation Quantities and Measurements, Radiation Commission of the International Association of Meteorology and Atmospheric Physics, Boulder, CO, 1978. 

Two of the more venerable works on multiple scattering are the review article by Milne (1930) and the book by Chandrasekhar (1950). A long-awaited treatise on this subject by van de Hulst (1980) recently made its appearance. Two reports, with many references, edited by Lenoble (1977) and by Fouquart et al. (1980), have been published by the International Association of Meteorology and Atmospheric Physics. 

An example of practical importance in atmospheric physics is the inference of effective optical constants for atmospheric aerosols composed of various kinds of particles and the subsequent use of these optical constants in other ways. One might infer effective n and k from measurements—made either in the laboratory or remotely by, for example, using bistatic lidar—of angular scattering fitting the experimental data with Mie theory would give effective optical constants. But how effectual would they be Would they have more than a limited applicability Would they be more than merely consistent with an experiment of limited scope It is by no means certain that they would lead to correct calculations of extinction or backscattering or absorption. We shall return to these questions in Section 14.2. 

ABSORPTION BAND. A range of wavelengths (or frequencies) in the electromagnetic spectrum within which radiant energy is absorbed by a substance. When the absorbing substance is a polyatomic gas, an absorption band actually is composed of a group of discrete absorption lines, which appear to overlap. Each line is associated with a particular mode of vibration or rotation induced in a gas molecule by the incident radiation. The absorption bands of oxygen and ozone are often referred to in the literature of atmospheric physics. 

Atmosphere Physics Department, Faculty of Physics, Moscow State University, 119899, Moscow, Russia... 

Laboratory of Atmospheric Physics Physics Dept., Campus Box 149 Aristotle University of Thessaloniki GR-54006 Thessaloniki, Greece... 

Tarasova Oksana 119899, Atmosphere Physics Dept., Faculty of Physics, Moscow Tel +7 095 9394847... 

Laboratory of Atmospheric Physics Aristode University of Thessaloniki 540 06 Thessaloniki Greece... 

Forest CE, Wolfe JA, Molnar P, Emanuel KA (1999) Paleoaltimetry incorporating atmospheric physics and botanical estimated of paleoclimate. Geol Soc Am Bull 111 497-511... 

Forest CE, Wolfe JA, Molnar P, Emanuel KA (1999) Paleoaltimetry incorporating atmospheric physics and botanical estimates of paleoclimate. Bull Geol Soc Am 111 497-511 Garzione CN, Quade J, DeCelles PG, English NB (2000) Predicting paleoelevation of Tibet and the Himalaya from 8180 vs. altitude gradients in meteoric water across the Nepal Himalaya. Earth Planet Sci Lett 183 215-229... 

Costas A. Varotsos received his B.Sc. in Physics at Athens University in 1980, and a Ph.D. in Atmospheric Physics in 1984. He was appointed Assistant Professor in 1989 at the Laboratory of Meteorology of the Physics Department of the Athens University, where he also set up the Laboratory of the Middle and Upper Atmosphere. In 1999 he became Associate Professor of the Department of Applied Physics at Athens University. He is Editor of the International Journal of Remote Sensing and Advisor to the Environmental Science Pollution Research journal. He has published more than 300 papers and 20 books in the fields of atmospheric physics, atmospheric chemistry, and global change. 

This case has been dealt with for continuous (rather than discrete) probability distributions in an earlier paper.27 Also, it is worth noting that the physics of this process are similar to the process of coagulation in atmospheric physics.37... 

P. Sprangle, J. R. Penano and B. Hahzi, Propagation of intense short laser pulses in the atmosphere, Physical Review E 66, 046418 (2002). 

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