1. 2. Gravity Waves

2. Overview Q: Why do we care about gravity waves? Q: What is their impact on the larger-scale flow? A: The atmosphere is full of gravity waves. –Q: Where do they come from? –A: Flow over mountains, convective and frontal activities etc. –We (you!) will be looking at the sources and distributions!

3. Overview Some gravity waves can propagate through the tropopause and up into the middle atmosphere (we will remind ourselves of the why and when). Some of these “break” when they get into the higher atmosphere. This “breaking” causes a significant damping on the zonal flow (which is the large-scale part of the study).

4. Overview We would like to see therefore: What does breaking mean and look like? What happens to the wave when it breaks? What happens to the surrounding flow when the wave breaks? And…how can we parameterize these effects in circulations models (and why should we?)

5. Breaking visualized…