tailieunhanh - Basic Theoretical Physics: A Concise Overview P11

Basic Theoretical Physics: A Concise Overview P11. This concise treatment embraces, in four parts, all the main aspects of theoretical physics (I . Mechanics and Basic Relativity, II. Electrodynamics and Aspects of Optics, III. Non-relativistic Quantum Mechanics, IV. Thermodynamics and Statistical Physics). It summarizes the material that every graduate student, physicist working in industry, or physics teacher should master during his or her degree course. It thus serves both as an excellent revision and preparation tool, and as a convenient reference source, covering the whole of theoretical physics. It may also be successfully employed to deepen its readers’ insight and. | Coriolis Force and Weather Pattern 97 which has as for flat Minkowski spaces one eigenvalue of one sign and three eigenvalues of the opposite sign. The space of Minkowski four-vectors x x y z ict thus becomes a curved Minkowski manifold where local coordinates of space and time may be defined by means of radar signals. Further details which would lead to Einstein s general theory of relativity will not be treated here although the effects of curvature of space and time not only play a part in present-day astrophysics . in the neighborhood of neutron stars and black holes but have also entered our daily lives through the Global Positioning System GPS a satellite navigation system which is presently used for many purposes. Coriolis Force and Weather Pattern Apart from elevator forces Coriolis forces are perhaps the most important inertial force. In contrast to centrifugal forces they are proportional to w and not x. w2 . not of second-order FCoriolis -2mt X V Particularly important are the consequences of this force in the weather pattern where the Coriolis force governs the deflection of wind currents from regions of high atmospheric pressure to those of low pressure. For example if there were a high pressure region at the equator with coordinates X -H y 0 and if the nearest low-pressure region were at X T y 0 then without rotation of the earth . for w 0 the wind would only have a velocity component vx . it would directly move from west to east on the shortest path from high pressure to low pressure. However due to the rotation of the earth 2n 24h Z where Z denotes the axis of rotation we have FCoriolis -2mt wvxey 98 14 Accelerated Reference Frames . a force directed from north to south. As a consequence in the northern hemisphere the wind flows out of the high-pressure region with a deflection to the right and into the low-pressure region with a deflection to the left. In addition for the so-called trade winds Passat wind over the oceans .