Dynamic Meteorology I, II, III (continued)

Starr also proposed that a similar study could be made of energy transports, pointing out that the total energy in the atmosphere would remain constant with the heat received from the sun being re-radiated to space.

The final lectures in Starr's Dynamic Meteorology III course were devoted to a review of the dishpan experiments, an example of which I was to see later in Dave Fultz's laboratory in Chicago. These experiments involved a study of the motion of fluid in the dishpan heated at the rim while the pan rotated. The motion relative to the pan was recorded by a camera mounted above, and rotating with the pan. These experiments showed pronounced similarities with the general circulation of the atmosphere at certain rates of heating and rotation of the pan.

I found Victor Starr's Dynamic Meteorology III lectures easy to follow and of great interest. I was impressed by his eagerness to have his theories tested by routine synoptic analysis and by comparison with the results of dishpan experiments. In retrospect I wonder whether his reference to the use of models related to the dishpan experiments of Pultz or to the work of Charney and Neumann in developing models which could be run on a computer. When I was a student at MIT computer modelling of the general circulation was in a very early stage and I cannot remember any reference to this work during the lectures on dynamic meteorology.

For me Starr's lectures were as absorbing as those of Hurd Willet and John Houghton. Those of Austin and Lorenz were valuable, as were those of Lettau described next. My interest in the subject of turbulence, which was the subject of the lectures by Lettau, was not great and their relevance to the knowledge I was seeking was small.

Bureau of Meteorology