3 credits
Fall 2025 Lecture Lower DivisionScience
The weather/climate system. Solar variability and Milankovitch Theory. Atmospheric scales of motion. Chemistry of greenhouse gases and aerosols. Fundamental laws of meteorological dynamics and radiation. Weather systems, air masses and fronts. Severe storms, hurricanes and tornadoes. (Required for atmospheric sciences majors.)
Learning Outcomes1Appreciate the temporal and spatial scales of climate change, from Milankovitch Theory and glacial/interglacial regions, to the anthropogenic effects of greenhouse gases (GHG’s).
2Appreciation of how weather events collectively and cumulatively, lead to the establishment of climate.
3Understand the basic scales of atmospheric motion (space and time) and the classification of weather events into these scales (planetary, synoptic, mesoscale and microscale).
4Understand the definition of aerosols and GHG’s and their relation to weather and climate.
5Understand the four basic laws of radiation (beginning with Planck’s Law).
6Understand the fundamental laws of atmospheric motion, and some general principles of weather prediction.
7Understand the basic principles of cloud physics, from CCN to cloud formation and precipitation.
8Understand the First Law of Thermodynamics, and the general concepts of thermal convection, including lapse rates and the concept of latent heat release.
9Understand the behavior, including simulation and differences, of geophysical columnar vortices, from dust devils to tornadoes to hurricanes.
10Understand the broad context of atmospheric science, from solar physics and space weather, to meteorology and lower atmosphere weather phenomena.
11Understand how the planetary atmospheric circulation establishes a jet stream and the semi-permanent pattern of wind and pressure belts (e.g., the trade winds and the westerlies).
12Understand the formation and movement of air masses and fronts, including the formation of Extratropical Cyclones.
13Understand the formation of thunderstorms, including severs thunderstorms, hail and tornadoes.
14Understand tornado climatology in the USA, the tornado intensity scale, taxonomy and climate considerations such as ENSO pattern of El Nino and La Nina.
15Understand weather hazards in the field of aviation, particularly thunderstorm phenomena (such as hail and downburst winds).
16Understand a basic review of weather/climate and energy (from wind farms to climate changes).
Restrictions
made by Purdue students.