A&O 3 Midterm

Horizontal pressure changes are ________ than vertical pressure changes

Horizontal pressure changes are ________ than vertical pressure changes

less than

According to the Ideal Gas Law, the pressure will increase if

the air density increases while the temperature is held constant

According to the equation of state p = RT,

an increase in density requires an increase in pressure or a decrease in temperature or both

Consider a closed container filled with air at a fixed temperature. Suppose we double the number of molecules inside the container and keep the temperature the same. What can we say about the changes in pressure and density in the container?

Density and pressure will both double

Consider a closed container filled with air at a fixed pressure. Suppose we double the number of molecules inside the container and keep the pressure the same. What can we say about the changes in temperature in the container?

Temperature will be reduced by half.

The atmosphere is a mixture of

gas molecules, small particulates, and moisture

Technological advances in computer hardware and software

have had a huge impact on our ability to understand and predict the weather

Radiosondes

allow us to measure weather conditions in the upper atmosphere

A network of surface and upper-air observations is crucial to meteorological understanding because

organized weather systems often cover large areas

The invention of the telegraph in the mid-1800s improved weather forecasting because

the location and movement of weather conditions could be tracked

According to the scientific method, a hypothesis

must lead to predictions

Atmospheric motions are mostly horizontal because

its shallowness doesn't allow large vertical motions

The troposphere

is thicker in summer

_____ will increase given an increase in pressure?

density

_______ Is used to identify places of equal atmospheric pressure?

isobars

Wind direction is properly referred to as

the direction the wind is blowing from

Radiation, as an energy transfer mechanism, is especially important because

radiation provides us with visible light, radiation energy can travel without an intervening medium, everything radiates.

Your hand feels cold when you hold a cold can of soda. Energy is being transferred from your hand to the can by

conduction

Warm air rises. This is an example of energy transfer by

convection

The relationship between air pressure and elevation is nonlinear because

air is compressible

Regarding isobars, it is true that

their spacing indicates the strength of the pressure gradient

Hydrostatic equilibrium occurs when

the force of gravity and the vertical pressure gradient have equal value and oppose each other

The heights of the 500 mb surface in air column A is 5700 meters and 5640 meters in air column B

the temperature in air column A is higher while the density is lower
Submit

If a column of air is heated, it will

have a smaller vertical pressure gradient.

The Coriolis Effect is zero at

equator

This is the layer in the atmosphere where friction is important in determining wind speed

planetary boundary layer

This prevents wind from following the direction of the horizontal pressure gradient force

the Coriolis effect

This occurs around a high-pressure system when the Coriolis effect exceeds the pressure gradient force, causing air to turn

supergeostrophic flow

Winds along the ridge axis are

faster than geostrophic because an increased Coriolis force is required to turn the winds to the right

Sea-level pressure is used instead of surface air pressure on weather maps for which of the following reasons?

To correct for the effect of altitude

If the pressure gradient force exactly balances the Coriolis force above the boundary layer,

A geostrophic wind occurs

What are enclosed areas of high pressure marked by roughly circular isobars or height contours called?

Anticyclone

Which of the following describes the reason why Hurricane Isabel is a low pressure system?

It is rotating counterclockwise.

When an air parcel moves north in the Northern Hemisphere, it gets deflected to its right due to the Coriolis force. What is the reason for this deflection?

The parcel is moving toward the axis of rotation of the planet, so it must spin faster to conserve angular momentum

In the video "A Year of Weather" from lecture 01, we observed a lot more swirling motion in the high latitudes than near the equator. What could be a reason for that?

The Coriolis force is larger in the high latitudes.

An updraft is a region of _______ air where clouds are likely to form. In an updraft we typically have that the vertical pressure gradient force is ________ then the gravitational force.

rising / larger

If the wind is parallel to the isobars, we can say that

the wind could be geostrophic, supergeostrophic or subgeostrophic

If we hypothesize that pressure gradient forces are the only forces driving horizontal winds in the upper atmosphere, what would be an observation that proves our hypothesis to be wrong?

Winds are mostly parallel to isobars in the upper atmosphere

Suppose the wind is initially in geostrophic balance, and then frictional forces are added. As a consequence, we would observe that

the winds speed decreases, the wind direction shifts towards the low pressure, the Coriolis force decreases

Water is unique because

it exists in all three states naturally at the same time

Advection fog

occurs when warm air passes over a cool surface

When air within a cloud begins to sink, it

warms at the saturated adiabatic lapse rate

If air starts out with a temperature of 18°C with a dew point of 10°C, an ascent of ________ is necessary for the air to become saturated

1000 m

Saturation

occurs when the condensation rate equals the evaporation rate

Frost forms on your windshield through which process?

deposition

Saturation vapor pressure is dependent upon this variable

temperature

Vapor pressure is

the part of atmospheric pressure due to water vapor

When the relative humidity is 100 percent

water will condense out of the air

the dew point

can be used with air temperature to indicate the value of relative humidity

As the temperature increases, generally, the relative humidity

decreases

During Santa Ana winds, air blows from the high deserts towards Los Angels. Suppose the mass of water vapor in the air does not change between the desert and L.A.

The relative humidity in L.A. will be lower than in the desert.

This is not one of the three processes for saturating air with water vapor

increasing the carbon dioxide content of air

Suppose we increase the temperature of an air parcel without changing its mass of water vapor. The air parcel is not saturated. We can say that:

Its dew point temperature will not change.

When the atmosphere contains more moisture than theoretically possible, the condition of ________ results

supersaturation

Which of the following is the relative humidity of an air parcel with a vapor pressure of 8 mb and a saturation vapor pressure of 16 mb?

50%

diabatic processes

add or remove energy from a system

What best describes the lifting condensation level (LCL)?

The altitude at which clouds begin to form in a rising parcel of air

adiabatic processes

often involve changes both in temperature and pressure

What will be the temperature of an unsaturated parcel of air at an altitude of 410 meters if it has a temperature of 10 degrees Celsius at the surface?

5.9 degrees Celsius

What best describes the process in which water droplets form onto hygroscopic particles?

Heterogeneous nucleation