Hydrology

Body force: forces that act uniformly on each fluid, ie) gravity and electromagnetic forces

Bowen ratio: sensible to latent heat flux

Catchment: area of land bounded by a divide which water flowing across the surface will drain into a stream/river and flow out of the area through a single specified point on that stream or river

Divide:boundary of a catchment, typically topographic highs, divides separate an area of land that should drain toward a particular point on a stream/river from surrounding land areas that do not

Evaporation: physical process involving a phase change from liquid to vapor by which water is returned to the atmosphere

Evapotranspiration: sum of all processes by which water phase changes to vapor and returns to the atmosphere

Hyetograph:graph; precip vs time

Hydrology:study of the occurrence and movement of water on/beneath Earth's source, its properties and relationship with biotic/abiotic factors of the environment

Interception: precipitation is temporarily stored on vegetation’s surfaces/litter surfaces, can return to the atmosphere as evaporation/can become stemflow/throughfall 

Isohyets: line of equal precipitation, estimate of areal precipitation 

Latent heat flux:rate/area at which latent heat goes to the atmosphere

Latent heat of vaporization: energy/mass absorbed during a phase change from liquid to vapor at a constant temperature

Potential evapotranspiration:max rate of et from a vegetated catchment under unlimited moisture conditions

Precipitation intensity: rate of precipitation, associated with a specific duration

Precipitation recycling: water enters the atmosphere from et in a region and later is precipitated

Residence time: average time a water molecule spends in a reservoir before moving to the next step of the hydrological cycle, in a steady state system=reservoir volume/inflow or outflow rate

Return period:how often an event occurs that is greater than a chosen value, opposite of an exceedance probability

Runoff ratio: ratio of average annual surface runoff to annual precipitation for a given land area

Sensible heat flux: internal energy of a substance that can be sensed, proportional to absolute temp

Shear stress:tangential force/area, acts on surface of a solid/fluid

Surface force: direct contact of surface of a fluid/solid

Throughfall: physical process, water is transferred from interception storage to soil surface by dripping off the leaves of the canopy

Transpiration: physical process by which water changes phase from liquid to vapor, released through the stomata, returns to the atmosphere

Vapor pressure: partial pressure exerted by a vapor within an air mass, concentration of water vapor in the air

Viscosity: measure of a fluid’s ability to resist deformation, influences flow