Biometeorology (J. Fuentes)

Meteo 563: Biometeorology
Spring 2010:  T R 11:15 AM - 12:30 PM
Classroom:  203 Leonhard
Instructor: Jose D Fuentes
Office:  508 Walker Building
Tel.   814 863 1585
E-mail:  juf15@psu.edu
 
Course Goals
The goals of this course are to study the interactions between the biosphere and the atmosphere, and to understand how land-atmosphere feedbacks respond to environmental change.
 
Course Description
This course introduces concepts to understand the interactions between atmospheric processes and living organisms. It also covers basic concepts to understand how the atmospheric environment influences the functioning of vegetated ecosystems and how plants in turn modify the surrounding environment. The course emphasizes the processes governing the transfer of energy, mass, and momentum between various landscape types and overlying atmosphere. We discuss micro- and meso-scale weather
and climate processes relevant to applications in forestry and agriculture. To learn how to scale processes from small (e.g., a single plant leaf or a soil plot) to large (e.g., a forest ecosystem) dimensions, one-dimensional models will be introduced. With these models, processes such as trace gas (e.g., carbon dioxide, ozone, isoprene) exchange between vegetation and the atmosphere will be diagnosed and predicted. Students will partake in at least one field trip to learn how surface-atmosphere  interactions are investigated using the most contemporary technologies.
 
There are no prerequisites in this course.