The Great Ice Age cycles associated with the variation of the atmospheric heat engine efficiency |
| |
Authors: | TANG Maocang GUO Weidong |
| |
Affiliation: | Lanzhou Institute of Plateau Atmospheric Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Lanzhou 730000, China |
| |
Abstract: | Investigating all the Great Ice Age events throughout the Earth’s history, each was found to follow a strong mountain-making process. Therefore, a hypothesis was put forward with its causality chain as: strong mountain-making process→great disparity in topography on the Earth surface→introducing efficient atmospheric circulation system (plateau monsoon) →increase in global atmospheric heat engine efficiency → generating more atmospheric kinetic energy → enhancing the planetary westerly (under the condition that the huge relief is longitudinal on the whole)→widening the temperature difference between the equator and the polar regions (restrained by the thermal wind law)→sharp cooling in high latitudes and the polars (supposing the solar radiation was approximately constant)→forming a Great Ice Age event. |
| |
Keywords: | strong mountain-making process plateau monsoon atmospheric heat engine efficiency the Great Ice Age |
本文献已被 万方数据 SpringerLink 等数据库收录! |