Spring Semester 2015 (class number: 8022)

Instructor: Prof. Brian Rose
Office: ES 315
Email: brose -at- albany.edu
Phone: (518) 442-4477
Office hours: by appointment

Meeting time: Tuesday, Thursday 2:45 – 5:05 PM
Meeting place: ES 328

Syllabus in pdf format

Course description and objectives:
The focus of this course will be hands-on investigation of the climate system using numerical and mathematical models. We will collectively get our hands on a range of models, including both comprehensive GCMs and assorted simpler process models. We will use these models to build our understanding of topics such as
  • The global energy budget
    • The greenhouse effect and radiative-convective equilibrium
    • Radiative forcing and climate feedback analysis
    • Orbital geometry, insolation, and the ice ages
    • Arctic sea ice and its coupling to the global climate system
    • Mechanisms of heat transport in the atmosphere and ocean
    • Links between tropical precipitation and global energy flows.
    • Ocean heat uptake and storage
The topics are subject to change and may be adapted to students’ interests.


Prerequisites: permission of instructor
The course will assume some exposure to geophysical fluid dynamics and climate dynamics at first-year graduate level. Some coding experience in a high-level programming language (Python, Matlab, R, NCL, etc.) is necessary.