Climate Dynamics
EPS 231 (Spring 2011)
Instructor: Eli Tziperman,
TF: Nathan Arnold, narnold at fas.harvard.edu
Day, time & location: Monday 1:30-3:00, Geo Mus 204 (24 Oxford St);
Thursday, 2:30-4, Geological Museum 418 (24 Oxford St);
Final course times to be coordinated with attending students during first
course lectures;
Location: Geological Museum, 4th floor, room 418. 24 Oxford St. Cambridge.
Outline | Textbooks | Detailed Syllabus | Bibliography | Requirements |
Detailed teaching notes and links to source materials, Matlab codes and more
Homework:
HW-01-EBM, due Feb 7
The basics of climate dynamics, from the feedbacks that maintain the mean climate to phenomenology and mechanisms of climate variability. We will cover energy balance models, climate equilibria and stability with examples from equable (warm) climate to snowball earth. Examples of climate variability to be covered are El Nino (occurring roughly every 4 yrs), the thermohaline circulation and its multiple equilibria and variability (decadal and longer); thermohaline variability as a possible explanation for the medieval warm period and the little ice ate (hundreds of years); the Dansgaard-Oeschger warming events observed in the Greenland ice core (every 1500 yr), Heinrich events involving massive collapses of ice during glacial times (every 7-10,000yr), glacial-interglacial variability (100,000 yr), and equable climate dynamics (50 Myrs). In each case, we will discuss physical mechanisms and demonstrate them with a hierarchical modeling approach, from toy models to GCMs. Needed background in nonlinear dynamics will be covered.
Familiarity with some basic Geophysical Fluid Dynamics (the equivalent of MIT 12.800, or Harvard EPS 131, EPS 132 or EPS 232), or general fluid dynamics (e.g., engineering fluid courses at Harvard) will be assumed. The course may be taken as a sequel to Harvard's Physics of Climate (EPS 208), or MIT's Climate Physics and Chemistry (12.842), but can also be taken independently of these courses.
Course homepage: http://www.seas.harvard.edu/climate/eli/Courses/EPS231/2011spring/
A detailed outline of the lectures, and a complete list of reference materials used in each lecture is available here.
Homework assignments are 50% of final grade, and a final course project will constitute the remaining 50%. There is an option to take this course as a pass/fail with approval of instructor. If interested, you need to obtain this approval during the first three weeks of the course.