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Many physical processes over ocean surface generate sea salt aerosols. One common cause is the bursting of air bubbles, which are entrained by the wind stress during the whitecap formation. Another is tearing of drops from wave tops. [19] The total sea salt flux from the ocean to the atmosphere is about 3300 Tg (3.3 billion tonnes) per year. [20]
Coarse sea spray has also been found to inhibit the development of lightning in storm clouds. [4] Sea spray is directly (and indirectly, through SSA) responsible for a significant degree of the heat and moisture fluxes between the atmosphere and the ocean, [5] [6] affecting global climate patterns and tropical storm intensity. [7]
Sea salt aerosol, which originally comes from sea spray, is one of the most widely distributed natural aerosols. Sea salt aerosols are characterized as non-light-absorbing, highly hygroscopic, and having coarse particle size. Some sea salt dominated aerosols could have a single scattering albedo as large as ~0.97. [1]
On September 20, 1950, a US Navy ship just off the coast of San Francisco used a giant hose to spray a cloud of microbes into the air and into the city's famous fog.
Because of its temperature, the atmosphere emits infrared radiation. For example, on clear nights Earth's surface cools down faster than on cloudy nights. This is because clouds (H 2 O) are strong absorbers and emitters of infrared radiation. This is also why it becomes colder at night at higher elevations.
Noctilucent clouds (NLCs), or night shining clouds, [1] are tenuous cloud-like phenomena in the upper atmosphere of Earth. When viewed from space, they are called polar mesospheric clouds (PMCs) , detectable as a diffuse scattering layer of water ice crystals near the summer polar mesopause .
The yellow color is due to the presence of pollutants in the smoke. Yellowish clouds caused by the presence of nitrogen dioxide are sometimes seen in urban areas with high air pollution levels. [22] Red, orange and pink clouds occur almost entirely at sunrise and sunset and are the result of the scattering of sunlight by the atmosphere.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and introduction to Oceanography.. Thermohaline circulation. Oceanography (from Ancient Greek ὠκεανός (ōkeanós) 'ocean' and γραφή (graphḗ) 'writing'), also known as oceanology, sea science, ocean science, and marine science, is the scientific study of the ocean, including its physics, chemistry, biology, and geology.