The Atmospheric Sciences include meteorology and climatology. Climatology: The study of atmospheric condition over periods of time (average, variation, and extremes) Methods are meteorological but results are geographical.

Brief History In ancient Greek culture, climate means “slope” in Greek. (incline of the earth’s axis) 400BC “airs, Waters, and Places” by Hippocrates Middle of 15 th century (age of discovery, sea voyages, and development of new trading areas) started descriptive reports of climates outside of Europe 17 th century, Instruments are invented to measure atmospheric conditions and scientific analysis of the atmosphere begin: (a)Galileo-thermometer 1593 (b)Torricelli-barometer 1943 (c)Boyle-basic relationship between pressure and volume in a gas 18th century, extensive data collection and description of regional climate began 19 th century, explanation of phenomena through the study of the physical processes Temperature and precipitation are the most widely recorded and longest records Central England: 325 yrs; Europe and United States: 200 years; most weather stations is less than 100 years 1817 von Humboldt constructed the first map using isotherms (lines of equal air temperature) 1885 balloons became widely used to monitor upper atmosphere (radiosondes) Important event: “the National Climate program Act’ signed into law in Sept 1978 stated :to establish a national climate program that will assist the nation and the world to understand and respond to natural and man-induced climate processes and their implications. (the first element was “assessment of the effect of climate on the natural environment, agricultural production, energy supply and demand, land and water resources, transportation, human health, and national security; The second element was “to improve the understanding of climatic processes, natural and human-induced, and the social, economic, and political implications of climatic change) IPCC report of 2007 won Nobel Prize with Al Gore

Areas of Climatology Physical Climatology: study energy exchanges and physical processes Dynamical climatology: atmospheric motion and exchanges that lead to and result from that motion Synoptic Climatology: relate local and regional climate to atmospheric circulation

Methodology: descriptive, statistical, mathematical and synoptic Scale: microclimatology, mesoclimatology, macroclimatology Areas of Applied climatology: 1.Biophysical (food-agricultural and fisheries, water-disasters and resources, energy-fossil fuels and renewable resources) 2.Socioeconomic (health-bioclimatology and comfort, community-air pollution and recreation, industry and trade-commerce, construction, services, and transportation)