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The Coriolis effect strongly affects the large-scale oceanic and atmospheric circulation, leading to the formation of robust features like jet streams and western boundary currents. Such features are in geostrophic balance, meaning that the Coriolis and pressure gradient forces balance each other.
The atmospheric circulation can be viewed as a heat engine driven by the Sun's energy and whose energy sink, ultimately, is the blackness of space. The work produced by that engine causes the motion of the masses of air, and in that process it redistributes the energy absorbed by the Earth's surface near the tropics to the latitudes nearer the ...
In meteorology, air currents are concentrated areas of winds. They are mainly due to differences in atmospheric pressure or temperature . They are divided into horizontal and vertical currents; both are present at mesoscale while horizontal ones dominate at synoptic scale .
A geostrophic current is an oceanic current in which the pressure gradient force is balanced by the Coriolis effect. The direction of geostrophic flow is parallel to the isobars, with the high pressure to the right of the flow in the Northern Hemisphere, and the high pressure to the left in the Southern Hemisphere.
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
In atmospheric science, geostrophic flow (/ ˌ dʒ iː ə ˈ s t r ɒ f ɪ k, ˌ dʒ iː oʊ-,-ˈ s t r oʊ-/ [1] [2] [3]) is the theoretical wind that would result from an exact balance between the Coriolis force and the pressure gradient force. This condition is called geostrophic equilibrium or geostrophic balance (also known as geostrophy).
If the Coriolis parameter is large, the effect of the Earth's rotation on the body is significant since it will need a larger angular frequency to stay in equilibrium with the Coriolis forces. Alternatively, if the Coriolis parameter is small, the effect of the Earth's rotation is small since only a small fraction of the centripetal force on ...
Wind is caused by differences in atmospheric pressure, which are primarily due to temperature differences. When a difference in atmospheric pressure exists, air moves from the higher to the lower pressure area, resulting in winds of various speeds. On a rotating planet, air will also be deflected by the Coriolis effect, except exactly on the ...