Science and Engineering at The University of Edinburgh

Environmental Sensitivity and Change

This page contains a list of links that may be of use to students taking ES+C, a second year course in GeoScience at the University of Edinburgh

ESC2 - The Atmosphere

A course on meteorology from Lyndon State College:
http://apollo.lsc.vsc.edu/classes/met130/notes/

An online 'book' Fundamentals of Physical Geography by Michael Pidwirny: http://www.physicalgeography.net/fundamentals/contents.html

Another online textbook with plenty of atmosphere stuff and lots more besides: http://www.uwsp.edu/geo/faculty/ritter/geog101/textbook/title_page.html

Some nice climate animations from the University of Oregon: http://geography.uoregon.edu/envchange/clim_animations/

A good explanation of the Coriolis force by David VanDomelen at Kansas State University: http://www.dvandom.com/coriolis/

A daft name but contans some interesting stuff: http://www.climate4you.com/

NOAA hurricane forecast page for the US - just for interest: http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/index.shtml

ESC3 - The Oceans

A lecture on ocean circulation from University of Michigan: http://www.globalchange.umich.edu/globalchange1/current/lectures/samson/blue_planet/index.html

NOAA/US National Weather Service page on oceans: http://www.srh.weather.gov/srh/jetstream/ocean/ocean_intro.htm

A good online textbook for Oceanography for those interested in pursuing it a bit further: http://oceanworld.tamu.edu/resources/ocng_textbook/contents.html

Up-to-date news from Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute: http://www.whoi.edu/oceanus/index.do

Oceanography in the UK is based at Southampton Uni: http://www.noc.soton.ac.uk/

Oceanography in the US is a government department: http://www.noaa.gov/

ESC4 - Atmosphere/Ocean Interactions - ENSO phenomena

An overview of ENSO by Pierre Madl: http://www.sbg.ac.at/ipk/avstudio/pierofun/atmo/elnino.htm

Some El Nino stuff from the University of Florida: http://ess.geology.ufl.edu/usra_esse/El_Nino.html

An article by Pielke and Landsea in the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society about the relationship between el Nino phase and hurricane damage in the United States: http://sciencepolicy.colorado.edu/admin/publication_files/resource-85-1999.14.pdf

The UK met office site for NAO prediction based on statistical analysis of sea-surface temperatures: http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/research/seasonal/regional/nao

ESC8 - Long Term Climate Change

A useful general guide to climate change, including orbital variations, by Joe Buchdahl, Manchester Metropolitan University: http://www.ace.mmu.ac.uk/resources/gcc/contents.html

The basics of 'The Astronomical Theory of Climate Change' along with plenty of references for further reading by Owen Davis, University of Arizona: http://www.geo.arizona.edu/palynology/geos462/21climastro.html

A lecture on climate variation during the Pleistocene by Russ McDuff, University of Washington, which is of interest both for long-term and rapid climate change: http://www2.ocean.washington.edu/oc540/lec01-30/

'Glaciers with time' by Jeff Sorenson and Philip Dak Helentjaris, which links up several elements of Quaternary glaciations: http://www.homepage.montana.edu/~geol445/hyperglac/time2/index.htm

NOAA slide sets on various topic including paleoclimatology - mainly nice pictures: http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/paleo/slides/slideset/11/index.html

ESC9 - Rapid Climate Change

NOAA paleoclimatology slide set - Heinrich Events: http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/paleo/slides/slideset/index19.htm

A good review paper of rapid climate change during the Quaternary by Adams, Maslin and Thomas: http://ethomas.web.wesleyan.edu/adamsetal99.pdf

Two key papers available over the web on the causes of Dansgaard-Oeschger and Heinrich events.

Bond et al. (1993)

MacAyeal (1993)