In this note we propose an improved technique to extract envelopes of wave packets of synoptic scale Rossby waves. In the currently used techniques the wave packets are assumed to be propagating along latitude circles. In our new technique, we take into account the possibility that the waves may propagate in a direction that is not purely zonal. We demonstrate the advantages of the new techniqu...

The secular variation of the thermal structure of the Martian atmosphere during the dissipation phase of the 1971 dust storm is examined, using temperatures obtained by the infrared spectroscopy investigation on Mariner 9. For the latitude range -20 ° to -30 °, the mean temperature at the 2mbar level is found to decrease from approximately 220 K in mid-December 1971 to about 190 K by June 1972 ...

In the 1700s, scientists, sailors, engineers and explorers were trying to work out how to navigate east to west at sea. The stakes were high; many lives were lost because sailors could not reliably measure longitude. Eventually, the invention of accurate timepieces allowed sailors to use the time in their current location, and the time at a fixed reference, to calculate longitude. But how do lo...

High-level ice clouds play a complex role in the global energy budget by affecting infrared radiation emitted by the earth’s surface. In order to understand the climate system, it is necessary to increase our knowledge about the microphysical, radiative, and optical properties of cirrus clouds. In situ measurements on microphysical structures of cirrus clouds have been made by using special, hi...

Pulsar radio emission is generally found to be linearly polarized over all longitudes of profiles, some times as high as up to 100%. The position angle sweep is in an ‘S’ shape, which can be well understood within the rotating vector model (Radhakrishnan & Cooke 1969). However, depolarization and position angle jumping are often found in the integrated profiles of some pulsars. In this paper, w...

Traditional box plots, described by Tukey in 1977, can be biased representations of geographic or spatial variables, since they do not take into account the areas associated with the elements of geographic variables. To help solve this problem, we propose and evaluate a spatially (areally) weighted box plot, a “geographic box plot,” that can be used to describe a wide variety of geographic vari...

Paleoclimate studies suggest that increased global warmth during the Eocene epoch was greatly amplified at high latitudes, a state that climate models cannot fully reproduce. However, proxy estimates of Eocene near-Antarctic sea surface temperatures (SSTs) have produced widely divergent results at similar latitudes, with SSTs above 20 °C in the southwest Pacific contrasting with SSTs between 5 ...

A tenet of macroecology is that physiological processes of organisms are linked to large-scale geographical patterns in environmental conditions. Species at higher latitudes experience greater seasonal temperature variation and are consequently predicted to withstand greater temperature extremes. We tested for relationships between breadths of thermal tolerance in ectothermic animals and the la...