Physical Meteorology

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Physical Meteorology
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Atmospheric science and its sub-fields
Dynamical meteorology
Mesoscale meteorology
Synoptic meteorology
Cloud physics
Atmospheric science
Atmospheric chemistry
Applied meteorology
Weather forecasting
Radiative transfer
Observations
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Atmospheric science as a part of geoscience
Oceanography
Atmospheric science
Glaciology
Climate
Biology
Geology
Earth System Science
Geochemistry
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Some example soundings
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Example 1 Midlatitude sounding with strong
inversion and dry conditions aloft
This sounding was taken during the Valentia
field trip in 2007 A layer of thick stratus
cloud was observed
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The sounding was associated with high pressure
conditions over Ireland
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Example 2Midlatitude sounding crossing a warm
front
Low pressure centre
warm front
front
Theta_e is conserved during the motion and is a
good flow tracer
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Example 3 Subtropical soundings
Chile
Caribbean
Moist subtropics (mean ascent)
Dry subtropics (mean descent)
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Example 4Conditionally unstable sounding
associated with a severe thunderstorm

• Morning sounding has high CINE
• By afternoon, surface layer has warmed
  sufficiently to overcome CINE
• Moist convection has taken place, bringing
  sounding above 700 hPa close to moist adiabat and
  reducing CAPE
• See movie!

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Satellite meteorology
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Geostationary orbit(METEOSAT, NOAA GOES)

• Geostationary Orbit Advantages
• Satellite permanently visible from all points
  within a large coverage area (about a third of
  Earth's surface). Allows sampling as often as
  technically possible (every few minutes at best),
  enabling monitoring of rapidly-evolving events.
• Only one ground station needed for satellite
  monitoring.
• Geostationary Orbit Disadvantages
• Polar regions are not observed.
• Low ground spatial resolution. The high orbit
  imposes a limit of about 1 km at best with
  current instrument technology.

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Polar orbit(METOP, NOAA TIROS)

• Polar Orbit Advantages
• Global coverage.
• Good ground resolution because of low orbit.
• Sun-synchronism produces consistent illumination
  conditions for observed surfaces, with only
  seasonal changes.
• A solar energy supply is ensured by
  sun-synchronism, although the supply changes
  around the orbit.
• Polar Orbit Disadvantages
• Continuous observation of every point by one
  satellite is not possible. Each point on Earth's
  surface is observed at best every orbit (100
  minutes) for polar regions, at worst twice per
  day for equatorial regions. Multi-satellite
  systems solve this problem.
• Continuous satellite monitoring would require
  several ground stations.

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METEOSAT channels

• Name Range (?m) Primary Use
• VIS 0.5 - 0.9 Daytime cloud-mapping and
  albedo determination
• IR 10.5 - 12.5 Day and night cloud-mapping
  and determination of surface temperature
• WV 5.7 - 7.1 WV features for synoptic
  purposes WV content in upper troposphere UTH
  (Upper Tropospheric Humidity)

WV
IR
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VIS
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IR
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WV
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PV and water vapour cut-off low and hole in WV
WV image of Lothar
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Infrared temprerature sounding
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Weather radar