Welcome to the GEOS 619, Boundary Layer Meteorology, webpage for the Spring 2018 semester.

Spring 2018 Lectures: M & W from 2:00 - 3:15 PM in PHSC 301.

Office hours: M & W from 3:30 - 5:00 or by appointment. (Please e-mail me to schedule something.)

Required book: Fundamentals of Boundary Layer Meteorology by Xuhui Lee.

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Click here for a PDF of the Syllabus.

The following is a summary of what we covered at each meeting. This page will be updated every few days as the course progresses...

Mon., 22 Jan., Review Syllabus, then basic thermodynamics, derive ideal gas law from Charles' law and Boyle's law.
Weds., 24 Jan., Lecture about the CHATS experiment, canopy waves, and stable boundary layers.
Mon., 29 Jan., Discussion of ultrasonic anemometers and fast response gas sensors for eddy covariance. Then, back to ideal gas law. Derive virtual temperature.
Weds., 31 Jan., Derive potential temperature. First law of thermo. Enthalpy.
Mon., 5 Feb., Distinctions between absolute, specific, and relative humidity and mixing ratio.
Weds., 7 Feb., Derive dry adiabatic lapse rate. Discuss parcel theory, static stability, derive Brunt-Vaisala Frequency.
Mon., 12 Feb., Overview of the atmospheric boundary layer and surface forcings. (PBL, CBL, SBL, ML, RL, EZ, etc.)
Weds., 14 Feb., Mean profiles of temperature, potential temperature, water vapor, and wind through the CBL.
Mon., 19 Feb., Importance of the PBL; then Ekman BL, Ekman spiral, Ekman transport, (in comparison to geostrophic balance).
Weds., 21 Feb., Discussion of the REAL and its uses in Boundary Layer Meteorology.
Mon., 26 Feb., Conservation of mass and momentum. Continuity Eqn, strong incompressibility assumption, and Equations of motion.
Weds., 28 Feb., Viscous and turbulent diffusion of momentum. Reynolds decomposition. Flux-gradient parameterizations.
Mon., 05 Mar., Conservation of mass equations for CO2 and H2O, conservation of potential temperature, surface energy balance.
Weds., 07 Mar., Review and discussion.
Mon., 12 Mar., Met in lab. Connected power to LI-COR 7500 gas analyzer and CR5000 data logger. Photo of lab setup today.
Weds., 14 Mar., Meet in lab. Continue work on eddy covariance system.
Mon., 19 Mar., Spring Break
Weds., 21 Mar., Spring Break
Mon., 26 Mar., Begin student presentations of Chapter 3: Governing Equations for Mean Quantities (Pages 29-56, Sections 3.1, 3.2, 3.3 and 3.4.)
Weds., 28 Mar., Student presentations of sections 3.5 (Hunter on Turbulence Closure) and 3.6 (Cab on Quantifying eddy fluxes) in book.
Mon., 2 Apr., Continue student presentations of sections 3.5 and 3.6 in book.
Weds., 4 Apr., Begin Student presentations of Chapter 4: Generation and Maintenance of Atmospheric Turbulence.
Mon., 9 Apr., Chris finished 4.1 (energy pools and transfers), David 4.2 (budget of MKE), Jillian started 4.4 (air stability).
Weds., 11 Apr., Jillian finished 4.4. Cab presented 4.3 (budget of TKE).
Mon., 16 Apr., Begin student presentations of Chapter 5: Flow in Plant Canopies. Cab presented 5.1: Canopy Morphology. Hunter began 5.2.
Weds., 18 Apr., Hunter completed 5.2 (Canopy volume averaging), Jillian 5.3 (Mean Momentum Eqns), Everyone 5.4, and David 5.5 (Budgets of MKE and TKE).
Mon., 23 Apr., SETs. Lecture: 5.6: Shear instability and transition to turbulence.
Weds., 25 Apr., David presented 7.1 (Basic constraints), Chris 7.2 (Point-source diffusion in homogeneous turbulence), and Steven 7.3 (Gaussian plume model for elevated sources)
Mon., 30 Apr., Class cancelled in order to attend College of Natural Sciences Poster session
Weds., 2 May, Hunter presented 7.4 (Diffusion from ground-level sources), Cab presented 7.5 (Diffusion in plant canopies), and Jillian 7.6 (Footprint Theory)
Mon., 7 May, No class. Instructor on travel.
Weds., 9 May, No class. Instructor on travel.

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