Courses

A broad inter-discplinary look at our marine world and its relationships to our climate, biosphere, and Earth history. Topics include hurricanes, origins of life and atmosphere, geologic processes under the sea (including tsunamis), dialog of the sea and climate, marine life of all types, the crisis in our fisheries, beaches and coral reefs, and man's use and mis-use of the sea.

The Earth System includes the fascinating inter-relationships of its life, climate, oceans, and geologic processes. In addition to a quick synthesis of basic principles, this unique explores several "hot topics" each year. Typical aspects include Gaia, asteroid impacts, "Snowball Earth", greenhouse warming and associated international politics, hurricanes, Ice Ages, climate models, geochemical cycles, volcanic winter, earthquakes and tsunamis, and Mars. Labs and field trips include National Weather Bureau, one of Indiana's enormous, coal mines, computer simulations, measuring atmospheric pollution trends and interpreting trends from satellite observations.

Find out what atmospheric science is about! This lecture series of invited speakers introduces you to the different fields and careers related to climate and atmospheric science.

Not open to juniors and seniors majoring in atmospheric science. An elementary treatment of the physical structure of the atmosphere and the dynamical conditions that lead to the development of convective clouds, thunderstorms, and severe weather (including tornadoes, hail, wind, rain, lightning, and flash floods). This course will also focus on storm climatology, the socioeconomic impact of severe weather, as well as prediction, detection, warnings, and safety procedures. Analysis of severe weather events will include tornado movies and case studies of ground/aerial surveys of storm damage.

Petroleum is a common thread that interweaves Geoscience with the Political-Economic history and Social-Environmental upheaval of the 20th century. Its dominance in current society has major repercussions on our future civilization and environment. The unequal distribution of petroleum has set the stage for the modern geo-political world. This course (joint offering by Earth & Atmospheric and Political Science departments) is be a unique survey into a multitude of aspects of petroleum -- from its formation to “resource wars”. Topics include the fascinating journey from Kerosene to Rockefeler to OPEC to Iraq wars, geopolitical distribution of petroleum fields, emergence of ultra-high-tech exploration, oil depletion and prices, petroleum replacements, and future geopolitics. Only a general background in 20th century history and a “crude” understanding of geoscience is needed. It is a fun and enlightening adventure.

To understand climate we describe and synthesize physical processes in the atmosphere and their coupling to the ocean, ice, and land. We quantitatively explore climatology with an equal balance of physical principles and scrutiny of available modern data. Topics include: visualization of atmospheric/land surface/oceanographic climatological data sets; theories of climate dynamics; and climate change. Beginning with radiative balance and simple energy balance models, the course progresses toward understanding the effects of radiative-convective forcing and rotation on the fluid envelopes. Analysis of data in an interactive computer-enabled environment is an important part of the course. By the end of this course, the student should know how the Earth System behaves at large scales and grasp the physical understandings of why.

An introductory course in meteorology and climatology with applications to daily life. The study of the fundamental physical principles behind weather and climate and how they apply to the homeowner and the world citizen. Emphasis is on how to interpret weather conditions and forecasts, what controls the wide range of climates in the world, and what the future may hold.

An introduction to the examination of global-scale resource utilization, food, energy and commodity production, population dynamics, and their ecosystem impacts.

This course is designed for upper-level undergraduates in science and engineering who have an interest in an advanced-level introduction to physical oceanography. Topics include physical and chemical properties of the ocean, geophysical structure of the sea, and oceanic stability. Global heat, salt, and water balance. Advective and convective circulation of the oceans. Ocean current systems and deep circulation. Surface waves and tides.

This course provides an introduction to environmental and natural resource economics and policy. Lectures and homework assignments provide insights into economic aspects of a wide range of environmental issues including air and water pollution, optimal forest and fisheries management, links between the economy and the environment, and global warming. Students learn how to examine environmental and natural resource issues from an economic perspective, and learn how to apply basic tools of economic analysis to a wide range of environmental issues.

A geologist is a detective. To decipher the fascinating history of our planet Earth, we must look for clues in the sediment record. This course is a hands-on survey of how to deduce past depositional environments (beaches, deserts, rivers, deep oceans), climate and ecosystems by examining sedimentary features, fossils, isotopes and relationships. The history of our Earth is deduced from the global correlation of these sediments and their records of environmental change. Case examples will span the spectrum from super-greenhouse episodes to Snowball Earth.

Concerned with the application of ecological principles to environmental issues, the course introduces fundamental ecology, emphasizing the interplay of theoretical models, natural history, and experimentation. New research developments are stressed, with the outlook for application to environmental management and restoration. Whole-biosphere issues, such as the loss of biological diversity, frame a focus at the population level to understand local and global extinction and community stability. In-depth case studies of endangered ecosystems (both temperate and tropical), with computer modeling, field trips, and discussions of policy formulation, demonstrate the range of tools and information necessary to accomplish coexistence of humans with the rest of nature.

A general introduction to the theory of climate at an intermediate level. A brief survey of physical climatology and paleoclimates. Theoretical development of climate models. Theories of climatic stability and climatic change.

An introduction to the chemistry of the earth's atmosphere. Covers evolution of the earth's atmosphere, its physical and chemical structure, its natural chemical composition and oxidative properties, and human impacts, including increasing tropospheric ozone, decreasing stratospheric ozone, climate change, and acidic deposition.

The prediction of future weather at a geographical point is primarily facilitated by knowing the weather at a given time in some surrounding region. The region will be larger as a longer period of prediction is considered. For a period longer than a month, the planetary-scale weather state has to be taken into account. Knowledge of the atmospheric general circulation is therefore indispensable in making mechanistic assessments of medium- to long-range weather forecasts and climate predictions.

In this course, we examine rigorously the fundamental principles that govern the large-scale physical processes and circulation patterns of the global atmosphere. The focus is naturally on the atmospheric dynamics. Attention is also given to radiative and convective processes. Land and oceanic effects will be discussed within the context. Topics include, but not limited to, Hadley and Walker over-turnings, the energy cycle, planetary-scale waves and eddies, wave-mean flow interaction, nonlinear dynamics in general circulation, El Ni\~{n}o -- Southern Oscillation (ENSO), and the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO).

Cross listed with EAS 591C - Atmosphere Chemistry And Climate Change

Thecomposition and climateof the Earth’satmosphere are changing in a profound way. These changeswill carry with them substantial environmental and social impacts, and yet also present us with unprecedented opportunities.In this course, we will examine the physical, chemical, and biological processes that determine the concentration of greenhouse gases and aerosols in the Earth’s atmosphere, the impacts of changes to those concentrations, and feedbacks between climate, atmospheric chemistry, and processes at the surface. This courseis appropriate for anysenior level undergraduate or graduate studentinterested inclimate change and atmosphericchemistry.Topics include: Atmospheric structure, radiation, and thermodynamics; The "greenhouse effect", and evidence of atmospheric compositional changes throughout history; The biogeochemistry of:CO2, O3, CH4, CFCs, N2O, and aerosols•feedbacks between chemistry and climate.

The study of past climate change helps Earth Scientists understand what the climate system can do and why. How hot and how cold has the Earth been in the past? How wet and how dry? How quickly can Earth’s climate change? Why do these changes happen, and how do they affect the chemistry of Earth’s atmosphere, oceans, and soils, the structure and composition of Earth’s ecosystems? By seeking to answer these questions, paleoclimatologists help us understand the bounds of variability in the climate system, factors that cause climate change, and potential trajectories of future climate.

The emerging interdisciplinary science of extreme events attracts considerable attention of atmospheric scientists, statisticians, engineers, and in the financial world. Its rapid development is spurred by engineering practice, economic and environmental disasters, and global climate change with anticipated increases in the frequency and intensity of extreme events. The course provides a systematic introduction to the statistical extreme value theory as well as hands-on experience with real climatological data. It is intended for graduate students but will also be suitable for strong upper-division undergraduates.

The objective of this course is to build a conceptual model of the terrestrial ecosystem and to provide students the state-of-the-art mechanisms of how terrestrial ecosystems work. We aim to instruct students on the new and exciting interdisciplinary research that is occurring across the boundaries of atmospheric science and terrestrial ecology. Topics include ecosystem concepts, Earth’s climate system, geology and soils, terrestrial water and energy balance, terrestrial production processes, terrestrial decomposition, terrestrial plant nutrient use and cycling, biogeochemical pathways, and ecosystem temporal and spatial dynamics. The course will be a combination of lecture, problem-solving and discussions based on current papers in the literature.

This course educates students in the use, selection, and design of instrumentation and data acquisition systems for agricultural, food, environmental and biological systems. Measurement of position (GPS), force, pressure, power, torque, flow, temperature and environmental sensors will be emphasized. Labs will focus on building and using measurement systems, and programming PC computers for data acquisition and analysis.

Society as a whole, particularly in the United States, has appeared not to be deeply concerned about global warming until late, and as a result, has been slow to act on urgent warnings from the science and advocacy communities. If the science of global warming is clear – why has society been slow to embrace the challenge and combat the problem? Why is it that we’re just now hearing the alarm that scientists sounded in the 1950s on how human activities were altering the atmosphere, and therefore potentially the climate, of the entire Earth? Why was it then and why is it now, so difficult to make climate change a relevant issue in light of its central role as a life support system? Is there something unique about climate change that makes it difficult to understand and communicate? How do we move beyond merely delivering a message on climate change to engaging public discourse and action? The purpose of this course is to explore the relationship between what we communicate and how we communicate it in order to excite public action. In reading Creating a Climate for Change: Communicating Climate Change and Facilitating Social Change, edited by Susanne C. Moser and Lisa Dilling, we will explore and discuss insights by contributing authors as to why the problem of global warming was not seen as urgent early on, and in turn, look at how communication efforts can be redesigned so that they can support public discourse and action. Additionally, we will explore how we can excite tomorrow’s talent, our children and young adults, about the wonders of science, technology, engineering, and math, which will equip them with the knowledge and skills required to explore and solve common world-wide challenges; and how we might best impart the requisite lessons on leadership and working in global teams so that they can create an inclusive, and sustainable world - community by community.

Concepts of solid angle, intensity, flux density, and attenuation coefficients. Kirchoff's law, Planck's law and consequences. The radiative transfer equation and its formal solution. Infrared radiative transfer of energy, absorption processes, and departures from thermodynamic equilibrium. Atmospheric optics and visibility, radiative effects of pollutants.

Data volumes in the environmental field are increasing with the advent of sensor networks, an increase in the number of high-resolution and multispectral remote sensing images, and the increasing use of distributed models. To make the most from these new and varied data streams students require a new tool box of skills so that they can handle data in a wide variety of formats, large numbers of files or even just a few very large files. This course educates students in the use, manipulation and analysis of environmental data by introducing them to scripting languages (e.g. c-shell, python), data types (e.g. ASCII, binary, NetCDF), databases (e.g. XML, DBF) and data visualization (e.g. GMT, ArcMap) as well as techniques for checking data quality, handling time series and spatial data, and filling missing data. Students will manipulate, check and fill data from a variety of sources, use that data as input to a distributed hydrologic model and analyze model output. Course will be taught as a 1 hour lecture followed by a 1 hour computer lab, twice weekly. All skills learned should be applicable to almost any computer operating systems, but most work for this class will be done within the Linux environment.