| Overview | An explanation of the Lapse Rate |
| Standard Atmosphere | A discussion of the 1964 and 1976 Standard Atmospheres |
Interactive graphs that help demonstrate these concepts.
| Seasons | This compares the seasons - winter, spring, summer - and has notes explaining DALR, SALR, ELR |
| Winter | 2 days in February |
| Summer | 4 days in August (A closer look at the surface) |
| Anchorage | North, near the pole |
| Tucson | Hot desert |
| Mesosphere | The Mesosphere and Mesopause are not shown on the other plots because the extended range (90 km vs 50 km) makes it harder to see the troposphere details. This plot shows the full Standard Atmosphere model for 1976 with those layers. |
Lapse Rate Animations (pc's only) - There is a lot to learn by looking at a single sounding plot. However, I have written a Windows program that allows you to look at a full year at a time.
Los Angeles Pierce College has a great introduction to Atmospheric Stability and Lapse Rates. I recommend it for its excellent graphics and Flash movies. In particular, I like the animation describing how mountains produce deserts in their rain shadow.
The Astronomy Picture of the Day for 2010 February 16 shows a beautiful picture of the space shuttle against the limb of the Earth. This image shows the blue mesosphere, a white stratosphere, and a red/orange troposphere.
The University Corporation for Atmospheric Research (UCAR) has a nice series on the atmosphere and its layers.
Author: Robert Clemenzi