IMPRS course 'Atmosphere, ocean and land'

1.  General information

Date: June 2025
Location: MPI-BGC, B0.002
Teachers: Axel Kleidon, Christoph Gerbig, Tarek El-Madany, Santiago Botia, Mathias Goeckede
Category: Courses related to BGC cycles
1.0 CP for the whole course

1.  Concept

IMPRS-gBGC core courses introduce doctoral candidates to scientific fields relevant to global biogeochemical cycles in which they have no deep knowledge yet. The purpose of those courses is to facilitate interdisciplinary communication and collaboration.

2.  Preparation

Please make sure that a working implementation of X windows system is installed on your laptop before the exercises start. For Windows, this could be Cygwin/X, for Mac OS you could use the X11 app. There is a variety of similar applications available, also for Linux systems.

3.  Detailed agenda

Legend
L = Lecture, P = Practical

June 18: Basics with Axel Kleidon (L, P)

9:00-12:30

• Overview of the module: goals, expectations
• Introduction to the climate system: atmosphere, ocean, land, ice, interior, structure, composition, global biogeochemical cycles, human activity and global change
• Atmospheric basics: forms of energy and energy transfer, first and second law of thermodynamics, ideal gas law, hydrostatic balance, lapse rate, barometric equation, Carnot efficiency, maximum work

14:00-17:00

• Radiative forcing: basic radiation laws, radiative temperature, variations in solar radiation, greenhouse effect
• Planetary energy balance: components of the global energy balance, atmospheric heat transport, planetary comparison
• Biogeochemical cycles: global cycles, residence times, geology and biogeochemical cycles, evolution of atmospheric composition
• Wrap-up: summary, next steps, feedback

June 19/20: Atmospheric Measurement Techniques with Christoph Gerbig, Tarek El-Madany

9:00-10:00 tbd

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10:00-10:30 tbd

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11:00-12:30 tbd

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13:30-14:30 tbd

14:40-16:00

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June 23: Dynamics with Christoph Gerbig

9:00-10:30 Motion in atmosphere and ocean, hydrologic cycle (L)

• global circulation of the atmosphere
• frontal systems
• basics of global ocean circulation
• hydrologic cycle, clouds

11:00-12:30 Numerical transport modeling (L)

• Meteorological observation systems
• Meteorological data assimilation
• Reanalysis, reanalysis products
• Atmospheric tracer transport
• Application: Atmospheric inversion

14:00-17:00 Exercises with numerical transport models (P)

• We will use a Lagrangian Dispersion Model (LPDM) and a global Transport Model to see how atmospheric transport and mixing of emissions and biosheric fluxes affects the distribution of CO₂ in the atmosphere.

June 27: Radiation with Santiago Botia

9:00-12:00 Absorption by atmospheric gases (L, P)

• black body radiation and the electromagnetic spectrum
• molecular absorption lines of major constituents of the atmosphere
• solar and earth spectra at the ground and the top of the atmosphere
• introduction to simple online radiative transfer model
• remote sensing of atmospheric trace gases

14:00-15:30 Attenuation by other atmospheric constituents (L, P)

• scattering in the Rayleigh, Mie, and geometric regimes
• introduction to aerosols and their optical properties
• direct and indirect radiative effects of aerosols
• cloud radiative properties
• testing cloud and aerosol radiative properties with 1-D radiation model
• multiple scattering

15:30-17:00 Further experiments with a 1-D radiation model (P)

• Following the examples introduced in the previous sections, further experiments will be carried out using the 1-D radiative transfer model, working in teams. Within the model we can test the effect of changing the quantity of various greenhouse gases, the aerosol optical depth, the cloud properties, and the surface albedo, among other things. By the end of the day the participants should have a better feeling of what 1 W/m² means, and the radiative implications of some proposed geoengineering methods and climate feedbacks.

tbd: Oceans and Cryosphere

09:00-10:30 Basic principles on global ocean circulation (L)

• Drivers of global ocean circulation
• Large scale surface and deep ocean circulation
• Large scale features of the surface ocean
• Southern Ocean and Arctic Ocean circulation

11:00-13:00 Global ocean carbon cycle (L, P)

• Carbonate system and ocean acidification
• Decadal global trends of oceanic CO2 uptake
• Climate Oscillations (El Niño and others)

14:00-15:30 Special role of the Arctic in the climate system (L)

• Arctic amplification
• Permafrost-carbon feedback with climate change
• Teleconnections

6.  Registration

Please register here.