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  2. Atmospheric instability - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmospheric_instability

    Atmospheric instability is a condition where the Earth's atmosphere is considered to be unstable and as a result local weather is highly variable through distance and time. [ clarification needed ] [ 1 ] Atmospheric instability encourages vertical motion, which is directly correlated to different types of weather systems and their severity.

  3. Stable and unstable stratification - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stable_and_unstable...

    The lower atmosphere is therefore heated from below (UV absorption in the ozone layer heats that layer from within). Outdoor air is thus usually unstably stratified and convecting, giving us wind. Temperature inversions are a weather event which happens whenever an area of the lower atmosphere becomes stably-stratified and thus stops moving. [2 ...

  4. Brunt–Väisälä frequency - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brunt–Väisälä_frequency

    In atmospheric dynamics, oceanography, asteroseismology and geophysics, the Brunt–Väisälä frequency, or buoyancy frequency, is a measure of the stability of a fluid to vertical displacements such as those caused by convection. More precisely it is the frequency at which a vertically displaced parcel will oscillate within a statically ...

  5. Baroclinic instabilities in the ocean - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baroclinic_instabilities...

    A baroclinic instability is a fluid dynamical instability of fundamental importance in the atmosphere and ocean. It can lead to the formation of transient mesoscale eddies, with a horizontal scale of 10-100 km. [1] [2] In contrast, flows on the largest scale in the ocean are described as ocean currents, the largest scale eddies are mostly created by shearing of two ocean currents and static ...

  6. Rayleigh–Taylor instability - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rayleigh–Taylor_instability

    This figure represents the evolution of the Rayleigh–Taylor instability from small wavelength perturbations at the interface (a) which grow into the ubiquitous mushroom shaped spikes (fluid structures of heavy into light fluid) and bubbles (fluid structures of light into heavy fluid) (b) and these fluid structures interact due to bubble merging and competition (c) eventually developing into ...

  7. Eady model - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eady_model

    First, the model assumes the atmosphere is composed of fluid obeying quasi-geostrophic motion. Second, the model assumes a constant Coriolis parameter . The model also assumes a constant static stability parameter and that fluctuations in the density of the air are small (obeys the Boussinesq approximation ).

  8. Convective available potential energy - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Convective_available...

    Positive CAPE will cause the air parcel to rise, while negative CAPE will cause the air parcel to sink. Nonzero CAPE is an indicator of atmospheric instability in any given atmospheric sounding, a necessary condition for the development of cumulus and cumulonimbus clouds with attendant severe weather hazards.

  9. Baroclinity - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baroclinity

    As the instability grows, the center of mass of the fluid is lowered. In growing waves in the atmosphere, cold air moving downwards and equatorwards displaces the warmer air moving polewards and upwards. [citation needed] Baroclinic instability can be investigated in the laboratory using a rotating, fluid filled annulus. The annulus is heated ...