atmospheric science

Atmospheric research in the middle of the Amazon forest: The Amazon Tall Tower Observatory celebrates its anniversary

Eva Pfannerstill September 16, 2020

The ATTO tower viewed from above by drone. Photo: Achim Edtbauer, Creative Commons license (CC BY-NC 4.0).

It looks like a spike, orange against the blue sky, sticking out the green ocean of the Amazon forest: Standing 325 m tall, the Amazon Tall Tower Observatory (ATTO) is the highest construction in South America. This tower celebrates its 5th anniversary this year, while the ATTO research site, located ~150 km northeast of Manaus, Brazil, has been in operation for 10 years. During the past 5 years, ...[Read More]

A simple model of convection to study the atmospheric surface layer

Dasaraden Mauree September 20, 2019

Since being immortalised in Hollywood film, “the butterfly effect” has become a commonplace concept, despite its obscure origins. Its name derives from an object known as the Lorenz attractor, which has the form of a pair of butterfly wings (Fig. 1). It is a portrait of chaos, the underlying principle hindering long-term weather prediction: just a small change in initial conditions leads to vastly ...[Read More]

The puzzle of high Arctic aerosols

Dasaraden Mauree September 19, 2018

Thick pack ice around the Arctic Ocean 2018 Expedition drift station. Ice crystals and droplets in the air create stunning optical effects (Credit: Julia Schmale)

Current Position: 86°24’ N, 13°29’E (17th September 2018) The Arctic Ocean 2018 Expedition drifted for 33 days in the high Arctic and is now heading back south to Tromsø, Norway. With continuous aerosol observations, we hope to be able to add new pieces to the high Arctic aerosol puzzle to create a more complete picture that can help us to improve our understanding of the surface energy budget in ...[Read More]

The perfect ice floe

Dasaraden Mauree August 28, 2018

The perfect ice floe, home to the Arctic Ocean 2018 Expedition for five weeks. (Credit: SPRS)

Current position: 89°31.85 N, 62°0.45 E, drifting with a multi-year ice floe (24th August 2018) With a little more than three weeks into the Arctic Ocean 2018 Expedition, the team has found the right ice floe and settled down to routine operations. Finding the perfect ice floe for an interdisciplinary science cruise is not an easy task. The Arctic Ocean 2018 Expedition aims to understand the linka ...[Read More]

How can we use meteorological models to improve building energy simulations?

Dasaraden Mauree September 7, 2017

Aerial view of EPFL campus, Lausanne, Switzerland. Copyright to Mediacom EPFL / Alain Herzog.

Climate change is calling for various and multiple approaches in the adaptation of cities and mitigation of the coming changes. Because buildings (residential and commercial) are responsible of about 40% of energy consumption, it is necessary to build more energy efficient ones, to decrease their contribution to greenhouse gas emissions. But what is the relation with the atmosphere. It is two fold ...[Read More]

How we might lose the battle against climate change … or against any other environmental problem?

Dasaraden Mauree March 6, 2015

Smog over the East coast of China (Copyright: NASA)

This would not be a blog about atmospheric science if I did not talk about climate change. But I won’t be talking about the science of climate change… there are numerous blogs including here that will talk much better about this. The problem that will be addressed here does not only refer to the “battle” we are currently facing with climate but also numerous other environmental issues ...[Read More]

Welcome to the AS division blog

Dasaraden Mauree February 10, 2015

The Atmospheric Sciences Division of the EGU is launching its new blog. This blog hopes to address a number of topics, as well as the major challenges, related to the atmospheric sciences. In this introductory post, I would like to present some of the topics we will address here and also some hurdles the scientific community is trying to overcome. First, let’s agree on some definition ...[Read More]