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Mathematical and physical ideas for climate science
- Source :
- Reviews of Geophysics, Vol. 52, no.4, p. 809-859 (2014), Reviews of Geophysics
- Publication Year :
- 2014
- Publisher :
- American Geophysical Union (AGU), 2014.
-
Abstract
- The climate is a forced and dissipative nonlinear system featuring non-trivial dynamics of a vast range of spatial and temporal scales. The understanding of the climate's structural and multiscale properties is crucial for the provision of a unifying picture of its dynamics and for the implementation of accurate and efficient numerical models. We present some recent developments at the intersection between climate science, mathematics, and physics, which may prove fruitful in the direction of constructing a more comprehensive account of climate dynamics. We describe the Nambu formulation of fluid dynamics, and the potential of such a theory for constructing sophisticated numerical models of geophysical fluids. Then, we focus on the statistical mechanics of quasi-equilibrium flows in a rotating environment, which seems crucial for constructing a robust theory of geophysical turbulence. We then discuss ideas and methods suited for approaching directly the non-equilibrium nature of the climate system. First, we describe some recent findings on the thermodynamics of climate and characterize its energy and entropy budgets, and discuss related methods for intercomparing climate models and for studying tipping points. These ideas can also create a common ground between geophysics and astrophysics by suggesting general tools for studying exoplanetary atmospheres. We conclude by focusing on non-equilibrium statistical mechanics, which allows for a unified framing of problems as different as the climate response to forcings, the effect of altering the boundary conditions or the coupling between geophysical flows, and the derivation of parametrizations for numerical models.<br />Comment: 44 pages, 22 figures. Major revision with respect to previous version. A glossary of terms is included at the end
- Subjects :
- 010504 meteorology & atmospheric sciences
Budget control
fluid dynamics
Climate dynamics
Astrophysics
01 natural sciences
010305 fluids & plasmas
Physics - Geophysics
Fluid dynamics
Statistical physics
Temporal scales
climate modeling
Physics::Atmospheric and Oceanic Physics
Mathematics
Earth and Planetary Astrophysics (astro-ph.EP)
Physics - Fluid Dynamics
Parametrizations
theoretical study
Dynamics
climate forcing
Physics - Atmospheric and Oceanic Physics
Geophysics
Thermodynamics
Energy and entropies
atmospheric dynamics
Quasi equilibrium
Numerical models
Spatial and temporal scale
FOS: Physical sciences
Non-equilibrium thermodynamics
Mechanics
mathematical analysis
Fluid dynamic
Numerical model
Climate models
Physics::Geophysics
thermodynamics
0103 physical sciences
Non-equilibrium statistical mechanics
Condensed Matter - Statistical Mechanics
accuracy assessment
0105 earth and related environmental sciences
Geophysical flows
Statistical Mechanics (cond-mat.stat-mech)
Parametrization
turbulence
Fluid Dynamics (physics.flu-dyn)
Statistical mechanic
Common ground
climatology
Statistical mechanics
Geophysics (physics.geo-ph)
Nonlinear system
Climate dynamic
Geophysical turbulence
13. Climate action
Atmospheric and Oceanic Physics (physics.ao-ph)
Dissipative system
Climate model
numerical model
Astrophysics - Earth and Planetary Astrophysics
Subjects
Details
- ISSN :
- 87551209
- Volume :
- 52
- Database :
- OpenAIRE
- Journal :
- Reviews of Geophysics
- Accession number :
- edsair.doi.dedup.....95a908bb1446f50f8baebdfc65ec12e7