HISTORY OF METEOROLOGY AND

INVENTION OF WEATHER INSTRUMENTS

Second Online activity

“History of

Meteorology”

The peer-reviewed journal produced by the ICHM. It has been assigned ISSN 1555-5763 by the U.S. Library of Congress. It is currently being indexed by two leading services: Isis Current Bibliography of the History of Science (from which citations are posted online on the RLG History of Science and Technology database) and Meteorological and Geoastrophysical Abstracts.

Meteorology Is the interdisciplinary

scientific study of the atmospher that focuses on weather processes and short term forecasting (in contrast with climatology). Studies in the field stretch back millennia, though significant progress in meteorology did not occur until the eighteenth century.

The nineteenth century saw breakthroughs occur after observing networks developed across several countries. Breakthroughs in weather forecasting were achieved in the latter half of the twentieth century, after the development of the computer.

Meteorological phenomena

Are observable weather events which illuminate and are explained by the science of meteorology. Those events are bound by the variables that exist in Earth's atmosphere. They are temperature, air pressure, water vapor, and the gradients and interactions of each variable, and how they change in time. The majority of Earth's observed weather is located in the troposphere.

They are temperature, air pressure, water vapor, and the gradients and interactions of each variable, and how they change in time. The majority of Earth's observed weather is located in the troposphere.

Different spatial scales are studied to determine how systems on local, region, and global levels impact weather and climatology. Meteorology, climatology, atmospheric physics and atmospheric chemistryare sub-disciplines of the atmospheric sciences.

Meteorology and compose the interdisciplinary field of hydrometeorology..

Interactions between Earth's atmosphere and the oceans are part of coupled ocean-atmosphere studies. Meteorology has application in many diverse fields such as the military, energy production, transport, agriculture and construction.

History..,

In 350 BC, Aristotlewrote Meteorology.Aristotle is considered the founder of meteorology. One of the most impressive achievements described in the Meteorology is the description of what is now known as the hydrologic cycle.

The Greek scientist Theophrastus compiled a book on weather forecasting, called the Book of Signs.

The work of Theophrastus remained a dominant influence in the study of weather and in weather forecasting for nearly 2,000 years. 25 AD, Pomponius Mela, a geographer for the Roman Empire, formalized the climatic zone system.

Around the 9th century, Al-Dinawari, a Kurdish naturalist, writes the Kitab al-Nabat (Book of Plants)..,

In which he deals with the application of meteorology to agriculture during the Muslim Agricultural Revolution. He describes the meteorological character of the sky, the planets and constellation, the sun and moon, te lunar phases indicating seasons and rain, the anwa (heavenly bodies of rain), and atmospheric phenomena such as winds, thunder, lightning, snow, floods, valleys, rivers, lakes, wells and other sources of water.

Research of visual

atmospheric phenomena

In 1021, Ibn al-Haytham (Alhazen) wrote on the atmospheric refraction of light.He showed that the twilight is due to atmospheric refraction and only begins when the Sun is 19 degrees below the horizon, and uses a complex geometric demonstration to measure the height of the Earth's atmosphere as 52,000 passuum (49 miles (79 km)),[which is very close to the modern measurement of 50 miles (80 km).

St. Albert the Great

The first to propose that each drop of falling rain had the form of a small sphere, and that this form meant that the rainbow was produced by light interacting with each raindrop. Roger Bacon was the first to calculate the angular size of the rainbow. He stated that the rainbow summit can not appear higher than 42 degrees above the horizon.

Equipment

Each science has its own unique sets of laboratory equipment. In the atmosphere, there are many things or qualities of the atmosphere that can be measured. Rain, which can be observed, or seen anywhere and anytime was one of the first ones to be measured historically.

Also, two other accurately measured qualities are wind and humidity. Neither of these can be seen but can be felt. The devices to measure these three sprang up in the mid-15th century and were respectively the rain gauge, the anemometer, and the hygrometer.

Satellite image of Hurrican Hugo with a polar low visible

at the top of the image.

Spatial scales

In the study of the atmosphere, meteorology can be divided into distinct areas of emphasis depending on the temporal scope and spatial scope of interest. At one extreme of this scale is climatology. In the timescales of hours to days, meteorology separates into micro-, meso-, and synoptic scale meteorology. Respectively, the geospatial size of each of these three scales relates directly with the appropriate timescale.

Other subclassifications are available based on the need by or by the unique, local or broad effects that are studied within that sub-class.

Microscale

Microscale meteorology is the study of atmospheric phenomena of about 1 km or less. Individual thunderstorms, clouds, and local turbulence caused by buildings and other obstacles, such as individual hills fall within this category.

Mesoscale Mesoscale meteorology is the study of

atmospheric phenomena that has horizontal scales ranging from microscale limits to synoptic scale limits and a vertical scale that starts at the Earth's surface and includes the atmospheric boundary layer, troposphere, tropopause, and the lower section of the stratosphere. Mesoscale timescales last from less than a day to the lifetime of the event, which in some cases can be weeks.

Synoptic scale

Synoptic scale meteorology is generally large area dynamics referred to in horizontal coordinates and with respect to time. The phenomena typically described by synoptic meteorology include events like extratropical cyclones, baroclinic troughs and ridges, frontal zones, and to some extent jet streams. All of these are typically given on weather maps for a specific time. The minimum horizontal scale of synoptic phenomena are limited to the spacing between surface observation stations.

Synoptic scale weather analysis

History of Weather Knowledge

For most of human history, weather predictions had to be made using pure observation. Babylonians attempted to predict short-term weather changes based on the appearance of clouds and optical halos, and Aristotle wrote a philosophical treatise called "Meteorologica" that included detailed theories on the formation of rain, clouds, lightning and many other weather-related phenomena.

It was not until the Renaissance that weather instruments were finally invented through the gains of technological advancements and the formulation of accurate theories about the weather. In the 20th century, more refined technology like weather balloons and Doppler instruments helped to make weather measurement quicker and more accurate.

WEATHER INSTRUMENTS..,

And there uses...,

Hygrometers

One of the first known designs of the hygrometer was written down in approximately 1450 AD by Nicholas of Cues, who described how to measure the humidity of air. An early hygrometer was built by Leonardo da Vinci and later in 1663 by Robert Hooke, using a piece of hair that contracted or expanded depending on the degree of humidity present. Inventions in 1783 by Horace-Bénédict de Saussure (who used human hair) and in 1820 (when J. F. Daniell used ether in glass tubes) refined the hygrometer.

Thermometers

Thermometers were progressively developed over time by inventors such as Cornelius Drebbel, Robert Fludd, Santorio Santorio and, most notably, Galileo Galilei, who in 1592 invented a thermoscope that reacted to changes in temperatures. In 1612, Santorio put a scale on the thermometer so that it began to resemble its more modern permutations, but it wasn't until 1714 that Daniel Gabriel Fahrenheit replaced the alcohol in thermometers with mercury and developed a more accurate measurement, later to be followed by Anders Celsius and Sir William Thomson (who invented the Kelvin scale) with their own measurements of temperature.

Barometers

Evangelista Torricelli is credited with inventing the barometer in 1643 to measure air pressure, but both Giovanni Battista Baliani in 1630 and René Descartes in 1631 had postulated a version of the barometer even earlier than that. Gaspero Berti, who had heard from Galileo about the design written down by Baliani, attempted to experiment with water in a vacuum between 1639 and 1641 to explain why pumps would not draw water above a certain height. Torricelli, however, approached it from a different angle and recognized that air had weight; he also recognized that mercury in a barometer was a suitable replacement for water. Years later, Blaise Pascal and Florin Périer refined the design.

Anemometers

Anemometers, which measure wind speed, were first described by Leon Battista Alberti in 1450, but the most familiar kind, the cup anemometer, was invented in 1846 by Dr. John Thomas Romney Robinson. The design was refined up until the 20th century: In the 1960s and 1970s, anemometers that used lasers or sonar to measure wind speed were.

That’s all..,

THANK YOU...,