When.com Web Search

Search results

  1. Results From The WOW.Com Content Network
  2. Coriolis force - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coriolis_force

    In physics, the Coriolis force is an inertial (or fictitious) force that acts on objects in motion within a frame of reference that rotates with respect to an inertial frame. In a reference frame with clockwise rotation, the force acts to the left of the motion of the object. In one with anticlockwise (or counterclockwise) rotation, the force ...

  3. Atmospheric circulation - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmospheric_circulation

    The Hadley cell is a closed circulation loop which begins at the equator. There, moist air is warmed by the Earth's surface, decreases in density and rises. A similar air mass rising on the other side of the equator forces those rising air masses to move poleward. The rising air creates a low pressure zone near the equator.

  4. Westerlies - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westerlies

    If the Earth were tidally locked to the Sun, solar heating would cause winds across the mid-latitudes to blow in a poleward direction, away from the subtropical ridge. . However, the Coriolis effect caused by the rotation of Earth tends to deflect poleward winds eastward from north (to the right) in the Northern Hemisphere and eastward from south (to the left) in the Southern Hemisph

  5. Air current - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_current

    A difference in air pressure causes an air displacement and generates the wind. The Coriolis force deflects the air movement to the right in the northern hemisphere and the left in the southern one, which makes the winds parallel to the isobars on an elevation in pressure card. [1] It is also referred as the geostrophic wind. [2]

  6. Geostrophic wind - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geostrophic_wind

    The effect of friction, between the air and the land, breaks the geostrophic balance. Friction slows the flow, lessening the effect of the Coriolis force. As a result, the pressure gradient force has a greater effect and the air still moves from high pressure to low pressure, though with great deflection.

  7. Rossby number - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rossby_number

    In low-pressure systems, centrifugal force is negligible, and balance is between Coriolis and pressure forces (called geostrophic balance). In the oceans all three forces are comparable (called cyclogeostrophic balance). [6] For a figure showing spatial and temporal scales of motions in the atmosphere and oceans, see Kantha and Clayson. [8]

  8. Coriolis force - en.wikipedia.org

    en.wikipedia.org/.../page/mobile-html/Coriolis_force

    In physics, the Coriolis force is an inertial (or fictitious) force that acts on objects in motion within a frame of reference that rotates with respect to an inertial frame. In a reference frame with clockwise rotation, the force acts to the left of the motion of the object. In one with anticlockwise (or counterclockwise) rotation, the force ...

  9. Wind - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wind

    The geostrophic wind component is the result of the balance between Coriolis force and pressure gradient force. It flows parallel to isobars and approximates the flow above the atmospheric boundary layer in the midlatitudes. [4] The thermal wind is the difference in the geostrophic wind between