A likely consequence of global warming will be the redistribution of Earth's rain belts, affecting water availability for many of Earth's inhabitants. We consider three ways in which planetary warming might influence the global distribution of precipitation. The first possibility is that rainfall in the tropics will increase and that the subtropics and mid-latitudes will become more arid. A sec...

A two level quasi-geostrophic model for zonally averaged conditions has been integrated for a period of a few years. The model is forced by Newtonian heating and has internal and surface friction. The interaction between the zonal flow and the eddies is simulated through the use of exchange coefficients for the transports of quasi-geostrophic potential vorticity and sensible heat. The results o...

The value of the analyses of the 200 mbar zonal winds is proposed as a particularly effective tool to assess variability and trends in atmospheric circulation. Using the thermal wind relation, the 200 mbar zonal wind results from the vertically integrated north-south temperature gradient between the Earth’s surface and 200 mbar. We found a tendency for the 200 mbar winds to become somewhat stro...

[1] Analysis of temperature retrievals from Mars Global Surveyor Thermal Emission Spectrometer data has revealed the presence of regular, eastward propagating waves in the Northern Hemisphere. A large amplitude, zonal wave 1 with a long ( 20 sol) period is particularly prominent during early winter (Ls = 220–270 ). After Ls = 270 , a weaker and more rapidly propagating (6.5 sol period) zonal wa...

The determination of metamorphic conditions is critical to the understanding of the formation of mountain belts. However, all collisional mountain belts contain large volumes of accreted sediments generally lacking metamorphic index minerals and are therefore not amenable to conventional petrologic investigations. By contrast, these units are often rich in carbonaceous material, making it possi...

CPEB is a translational regulatory sequence-specific RNA-binding protein that controls germ cell development. Here we show that CPEB heterozygous female mice are fertile but contain disorganized mammary epithelial cells, in which zonal occludens-1 and claudin-3, apical tight-junction proteins, are mislocalized. CPEB depletion from mammary epithelial cells disrupts zonal occludens-1 apical local...

We have used a linearized nondivergent barotropic vorticity model on a sphere to intercompare the fastest growing, barotropically unstable wave modes computed for zonal jets at high latitudes in the middle atmospheres of Venus, Earth, and Mars. Such zonal jets have been observed in the wintertime stratosphere on Earth and have been inferred from remotely sensed temperatures in the Venus middle ...

An idealized atmospheric general circulation model is used to investigate the factors controlling the time scale of intraseasonal (10–100 day) variability of the extratropical atmosphere. Persistence on these time scales is found in patterns of variability that characterize meridional vacillations of the extratropical jet. Depending on the degree of asymmetry in the model forcing, patterns take...

Where plates converge, one-sided subduction generates two contrasting thermal environments in the subduction zone (low dT/dP) and in the arc and subduction zone backarc or orogenic hinterland (high dT/dP). This duality of thermal regimes is the hallmark of modern plate tectonics, which is imprinted in the ancient rock record as penecontemporaneous metamorphic belts of two contrasting types, one...

We present a short review of our current knowledge on Saturn’s stratospheric thermal structure and composition (hydrocarbons) based on recent Cassini/CIRS observations. Anomalies in the temperature field and in the meridional distribution of hydrocarbons hint at atmospheric dynamical phenomena at play. The two most notable features are an obseved asymmetry in the hydrocarbons distribution at hi...