atmosphere: Media
gaseous envelope
Videos
Earth's atmosphere is a mixture of nitrogen, oxygen, water vapour, carbon dioxide,...
Video: Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
The water cycle begins and ends in the ocean.
Video: Created and produced by QA International. © QA International, 2010. All rights reserved. www.qa-international.com
Living organisms influence the cycling of carbon and oxygen through the environment.
Video: Created and produced by QA International. © QA International, 2010. All rights reserved. www.qa-international.com
The process by which some elements are able to escape from Earth's atmosphere into...
Video: © MinuteEarth (A Britannica Publishing Partner)
How much does a cloud weigh?
Video: © American Chemical Society (A Britannica Publishing Partner)
Dust and other aerosols suspended in the atmosphere provide the surfaces upon which...
Video: Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
Learn why the sky is blue.
Video: © MinutePhysics (A Britannica Publishing Partner)
An overview of the role greenhouse gases play in modifying Earth's climate.
Video: Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
Images
The atmospheres of planets in the solar system are composed of various gases, particulates,...
© Kushnirov Avraham/Dreamstime.com
Earth's environment includes the atmosphere, the hydrosphere, the lithosphere, and...
Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
The primary cause of Earth's seasons is the change in the amount of sunlight reaching...
© Merriam-Webster Inc.
When the surface is substantially warmer than the overlying air, mixing will spontaneously...
Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
A rising parcel of air cools faster than the environment that surrounds it, causing...
Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
This diagram shows how, in the hydrologic cycle, water is transferred between the...
Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
The nitrogen cycle transforms diatomic nitrogen gas into ammonium, nitrate, and nitrite...
Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
Mount St. Helens volcano, viewed from the south during its eruption on May 18, 1980.
© Getty Images
Carbon is transported in various forms through the atmosphere, the hydrosphere, and...
Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
The layers of Earth's atmosphere, showing heights of characteristic atmospheric phenomena.
Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
The layers of Earth's atmosphere, with a yellow line showing the air temperature...
Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
Cirrus fibratus are high clouds that are nearly straight or irregularly curved. They...
Nick Impenna/Photo Researchers
Altocumulus radiatus, a cloud layer with laminae arranged in parallel bands.
Lawrence Smith/Photo Researchers
Cumulus humilis, flattened clouds characterized by only a small vertical extent....
© Nicholas A. Tonelli (CC BY 2.0)
The Van Allen radiation belts contained within Earth's magnetosphere. Pressure from...
Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
The Erg Admer, a large area of sand dunes in southern Algeria, is located within...
© Patrick Gruban
As seen from a fixed point in space, a parcel of air would be moving in a straight...
Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
Bands of dense clouds swirl around Venus, shown in a photograph taken by the Mariner...
Jet Propulsion Laboratory/National Aeronautics and Space Administration
Jupiter's Great Red Spot and its surroundings, photographed by Voyager 1, February...
Photo NASA/JPL/Caltech (NASA photo # PIA00014)
False-colour mosaic of two of the long-lived white ovals south of the Great Red Spot,...
Photo NASA/JPL/Caltech (NASA photo # PIA00857)
Earth's atmosphere as seen from the International Space Station. The dividing line...
NASA
False-colour mosaic of a part of Jupiter's northern hemisphere, made from images...
Photo NASA/JPL/Caltech (NASA photo # PIA00895)
View of Titan's upper atmosphere from the Cassini-Huygens spacecraft.
NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute
False-colour image of Uranus and its rings, based on observations made by the Hubble...
STScI/NASA/JPL
Giant vortices in Jupiter's southern hemisphere, imaged by the Galileo spacecraft...
Photo NASA/JPL/Caltech (NASA photo # PIA01230)
Figure 3: Average molecular mass of the atmosphere in atomic units (one atomic unit...
Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
Figure 17: Changes in the global mean temperature expected due to past and anticipated...
From Atmospheric Ozone 1985, World Meteorological Organization, Report No. 16, (1986), by courtesy of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration
The Keeling Curve, named after American climate scientist Charles David Keeling,...
Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
Meridional cross section of the atmosphere to a height of 60 km (37 miles) in Earth's...
Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
A “best guess” reconstruction of the abundance of O2 in Earth's atmosphere...
Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
Figure 1: A schematic representation of the biogeochemical cycle of carbon.
Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
Figure 5: Energy budget for the surface of the Earth illustrating what happens, on...
Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
In Earth's atmosphere, the limits of the atmospheric layers are approximate and variable,...
© Merriam-Webster Inc.
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