- Industria: Weather
- Number of terms: 60695
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The American Meteorological Society promotes the development and dissemination of information and education on the atmospheric and related oceanic and hydrologic sciences and the advancement of their professional applications. Founded in 1919, AMS has a membership of more than 14,000 professionals, ...
A method of problem solving that consists of generating possible scenarios and testing each until a satisfactory solution is found. Not all possible scenarios are tested, and the solution found may not be optimal.
Industry:Weather
A method to approximate the surface energy budget that accounts for storage of heat in the top layer of soil. In this model the ground is conceptually split into two layers, a relatively thin layer near the top with uniform temperature, and a deep soil layer also of uniform but different temperature. The thickness of the top layer is carefully chosen based on the region where a periodic temperature surface forcing has appreciable effect. The net result is that flux from the deep soil layer tends to restore the top layer, opposing any radiative forcing from the atmosphere. This method is an alternative to a multilayer soil model, which is computationally more expensive.
Industry:Weather
A model with dependent variables represented as a finite series of piecewise- developed polynomial basis functions (finite elements), as opposed to globally defined Fourier or spherical harmonic functions. Each basis function is nonzero only over a very small part of the domain. Examples are hat functions and piecewise-defined cubic splines.
Industry:Weather
A mirage, but the specific physical circumstances under which fata morgana should be applied to a particular sighting are ill-defined. The best that can be said is that the mirage interacts with features in the landscape to present a scene of sufficient ambiguity that viewers often arrive at quite fanciful interpretations. Cases reported include those of the apparent sighting of cities, mountains, forests, or islands (sometimes metamorphosing one into the other) in places where it was known that no such things existed. Indeed, the mirage's eponym is the fairy Morgan, the legendary half-sister of King Arthur, whose magical powers enabled her to create castles in the air (“fata“ is Italian for “fairy“). It is not that any particular occurrence is the least bit mysterious or that either the meteorological or optical behavior is difficult to understand. Indeed, most cases of the fata morgana are undoubtedly multiple- image superior mirages, sometimes with marked magnification, sometimes complicated by periodic inhomogeneities, sometimes augmented by an inferior mirage. Compare fata bromosa.
Industry:Weather
A method using absorption of water vapor by a desiccant from a known volume of air. The mass of water vapor is determined through the weighing of the drying agent before and after absorbing the vapor. This method is used mostly in national calibration laboratories for providing an absolute reference standard.
Industry:Weather
A mass of hummocked ice, formed by the piling up of many ice floes by lateral pressure; an extreme form of pressure ice. It may be more than 50 ft high and resemble an iceberg.
Industry:Weather
A mass of land ice, formed by the further recrystallization of firn, flowing continuously from higher to lower elevations. This term covers all such ice accumulations from the extensive continental glacier to tiny snowdrift glaciers. Nearly all glaciers are classified according to the topographical features with which they are associated, for example, highland glacier, plateau glacier, piedmont glacier, valley glacier, cirque glacier. They are also classified according to their seasonal temperatures, or melting characteristics, as temperate glaciers or polar glaciers. If a glacier is flowing, it is active or living; but an active glacier may be advancing or retreating depending upon the rate of flow compared to the rate of ablation at the terminus. A glacier that has ceased to flow is termed stagnant or dead.
Industry:Weather
A measure of the intensity of gusts given by the ratio of the total range of wind speed between gusts and the intermediate periods of lighter wind to the mean wind speed, averaged over both gusts and lulls.
Industry:Weather
A meteorological station at which autographic records or hourly readings of atmospheric pressure, temperature, humidity, wind, sunshine, and precipitation are made, together with observations at fixed hours of the amount and form of clouds and notes on the weather. Compare first-order station.
Industry:Weather
