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Atmospheric thermodynamics is the study of heat-to-work transformations (and their reverse) that take place in the Earth's atmosphere and manifest as weather or climate. . Atmospheric thermodynamics use the laws of classical thermodynamics, to describe and explain such phenomena as the properties of moist air, the formation of clouds, atmospheric convection, boundary layer meteorology, and ...
Atop the troposphere is the tropopause, which is the functional atmospheric border that demarcates the troposphere from the stratosphere. As such, because the tropopause is an inversion layer in which air-temperature increases with altitude, the temperature of the tropopause remains constant. [2] The layer has the largest concentration of nitrogen.
The stratosphere is also the altitude limit of jets and weather balloons, as air is roughly a thousand times thinner there than at the troposphere. [ 11 ] Commercial airliners typically cruise at altitudes of 9–12 km (30,000–39,000 ft) which is in the lower reaches of the stratosphere in temperate latitudes. [ 12 ]
The stratospheric temperature profile creates very stable atmospheric conditions, so the stratosphere lacks the weather-producing air turbulence that is so prevalent in the troposphere. Consequently, the stratosphere is almost completely free of clouds and other forms of weather. However, polar stratospheric or nacreous clouds are occasionally ...
The thermosphere (or the upper atmosphere) is the height region above 85 kilometres (53 mi), while the region between the tropopause and the mesopause is the middle atmosphere (stratosphere and mesosphere) where absorption of solar UV radiation generates the temperature maximum near an altitude of 45 kilometres (28 mi) and causes the ozone layer.
These layers are the troposphere, stratosphere, mesosphere, and thermosphere. The troposphere is the lowest of the four layers and extends from the surface of the Earth to about 11 km (6.8 mi) into the atmosphere, where the tropopause (the boundary between the troposphere stratosphere) is located. The width of the troposphere can vary depending ...
On Earth, most weather phenomena occur in the lowest layer of the planet's atmosphere, the troposphere, [2] [3] just below the stratosphere. Weather refers to day-to-day temperature, precipitation, and other atmospheric conditions, whereas climate is the term for the averaging of atmospheric conditions over longer periods of time. [4]
In 1949 Alan West Brewer proposed that tropospheric air passes through the tropopause into the stratosphere near the equator, then travels through the stratosphere to temperate and polar regions, where it sinks into the troposphere. [12] This is now known as Brewer-Dobson circulation. Because gases primarily enter the stratosphere by passing ...