Physical Climatology

Contents: 1. Introduction. 2. The climatology of the hemispheres. 3. Solar radiation. 4. Infrared radiation. 5. The radiation balance. 6.  Radiation instruments. 7.  The water balance and the hydrologic cycle. 8.  The energy balance. 9.  Heat transfer in soil.  10.  Turbulent transfer and wind relationships.  11.  Evaporation and evapotranspiration.  12.  Atmospheric diffusion.  13.  Paleoclimatology and theories of climatic change. Appendices. References. Index.

This text is based on a wide range of disciplines, including meteorology, hydrology, watershed and range management, agricultural chemistry and soils, agricultural economics, botany, zoology, electrical and civil engineering, geography, and geochronology. Most of the students are in the Graduate College, and all have had at least an introductory course in meteorology.

The mathematical preparation of the students various considerably. Some have carried their training through boundary value problems and complex variables; others have had little more than college algebra and have done poorly in that. To teach a course that would be useful and interesting to all of these students turned out to be almost impossible.