Meteorology: Understanding the Atmosphere            Ackerman and Knox

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The purpose of these applets, animations and activities is to help you better understand concepts presented in the book. The following is a list of applets and activities that can be used to help learn material in a given chapter of the book: Meteorology: Understanding the atmosphere by Ackerman and Knox Published by. 

The applets have been developed by Tom Whittaker and Steve Ackerman.  Tom has also developed the QuizImage applet and the animation applets, both of which are available over the internet.

Chapter 1: Introduction

Translating the Surface Model
Learning to Contour
Correcting Surface Pressure
Animation of the eruption of Mount St. Helens
Animation of smoke plume from fires in Mexico

Chapter 2: Energy Cycle

Temperature Conversions
Radiant Energy Curves
Incoming Solar Energy
Introduction to "Greenhouse Warming"
Animation of Planetary Albedo
Animation of Planetary Outgoing Longwave Radiation
Animation of Planetary Net Radiative Energy Budget
Animation of Figure 2.19
UV radiation and skin cancer

Chapter 3: Temperature

Compute wind chill temperature
Forecasting Frost
Temperature Conversions: from Chapter 2
Introduction to "Greenhouse Warming": If you have not done this activity in Chapter 2, you might want to visit this link now. 

Chapter 4: Water in the Atmosphere

Exploring Humidity
Cloud Base Altitude
Growing a Snowflake
Precipitation Type
Animation of global cloud cover
Table of hydrometer types

Chapter 5: Observing the Atmosphere

Satellite Image Interpretation
Why we can't see underwater
Why mixing paints doesn't result in white
Theories of light

Chapter 6: Atmospheric Forces and Winds

Play ball!
Balance of Forces
Cyclostrophic Wind

Chapter 7: Global-Scale Winds

Jet streams and thermal gradients
Discover features in a satellite image
Animation of subtropical jet stream in satellite image

Chapter 8: Atmosphere-Ocean Interactions

U.S. Snow Cover and El Niño
Hurricane Winds
Animation of Hurricane Iris
Animations of Hurricane Mitch
Hurricane Intensity

Chapter 9: Air Masses and Fronts

Identifying Air Masses
Identifying Fronts 

Chapter 10: Extratropical Cyclones and Anticylcones

Storm of November 10 and 11 1998
Ozone and the JFK Jr. crash

Chapter 11: Thunderstorms and Tornadoes

Grow a Thunderstorm
Stability Indices
Tornados and the F-scale
Thunder and Lightning
Overshooting Top
Enhanced-V
03 May 1999 tornado outbreak
August 8, 2001 Thunderstorm over North Dakota and Minnesota

Chapter 12: Small-scale Winds

Poetry in Motion: Wake Lows
Mountain lee waves: An animation of Figure 12.6.
Sierra Nevada mountain range:
Great Lake Breeze: A satellite animation of a lake breeze.
Gravity Waves in a satellite image
Katabatic Wind in a satellite image. 

Chapter 13: Weather Forecasting

Barotropic weather forecast model
Forecasting Frost: See Chapter 3

Chapter 14: Past and Present Climate

Climate and Mysteries
Köppen scheme
Climate Temporal Scales
Climate Spatial Scales
Greenland Ice Sheet

Chapter 15: Human Influences on Climate

Contrail Formation
Urban Heat Island
Daisy World Applet
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