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The oceans are an integral and important part of the climate system. The Oceans and Climate introduces the multi-disciplinary controls on air-sea interaction – physical, chemical and biological – and shows how these interact. It demonstrates how the ocean contributes to, and is affected by, climate processes on timescales from seasonal to millennial and longer. Past, present and future relationships between the ocean and climate are discussed. The new edition of this successful textbook has been completely updated throughout, with extensive new material on thermohaline processes in the ocean and their link to both abrupt climate change and longer-term climate change. It will prove an ideal course and reference book for undergraduate and graduate students studying earth and environmental sciences, oceanography, meteorology and climatology. The Oceans and Climate will also be useful for students and teachers of geography, physics, chemistry and biology.
Preface
1. The climate system
2. Physical interaction between the ocean and atmosphere
3. Chemical interaction of the atmosphere and ocean
4. Biogeochemical interaction of the atmosphere and ocean
5. Large-scale air-sea interaction
6. The ocean and natural climatic variability
7. The ocean and climatic change
Appendices
Glossary
Bibliography
Index
Grant R. Bigg is a Senior Lecturer at the School of Environmental Sciences, University of East Anglia. He was Editor of the Royal Meteorological Society's magazine Weather from 1998 to 2003, and has served on the Council of the Society. He has published over seventy peer-reviewed papers and contributed to popular science magazines such as The Geographical Magazine.
"Climate change has influenced the origin and growth of early civilisations and will continue to do so. Grant Bigg's The Oceans and Climate introduces a multidisciplinary approach to this central problem affecting human wellbeing [...] The book takes us through the planetary phenomena that affect global climate [...] offers an excellent mathematical introduction to these complex issues, and should be read by students of oceanography, whatever their background."
- New Scientist
"This well written and richly illustrated book [...] provides a reasonably priced, lucid, and not too technical, survey of the complex system called 'climate', with emphasis on the special role played by the world's oceans, but not neglecting other pieces in a multifaceted puzzle."
- Meteorology and Atmospheric Physics
"[...] fills an important niche in the undergraduate curriculum dealing with the past, present, and future issues of global change [...] well illustrated with a large number of maps, graphs, and schematic illustrations [...] An important resource for undergraduate courses in a variety of subject disciplines."
- Choice
"[...] an extremely valuable reference book on an immensely important subject for many scientific disciplines."
- Journal of Quaternary Science
"[...] the second edition of The Oceans and Climate is as accessible and understandable as the first [...] I would strongly urge anybody involved in teaching this subject at undergraduate o postgraduate level to do likewise, whilst general researchers and readers will benefit from such a clear and concise book."
- Weather
"[...] I found the book very interesting. Never having had more than a passing interest in the subject I found the book answered a number of questions I had not realised I wanted to ask. I have now added Oceanography to my list of courses to do."
- The Open University Geological Society Journal
"[...] a well written and richly illustrated book. [...] the book is conceptually modern and up-to-date. [...] the second edition of this well-accepted book is a valuable account of the major problems, methods and results of the role the oceans play in the complex climate system. It can be recommended to a wide audience, undergraduate as well as graduate students for serious learning up to lay people for a quick survey of the field and for some appreciation of the contemporary emphasis international science puts upon the oceans"
- Meteorologische Zeitschrift
"This book could certainly be used as the key text for a first or second year undergraduate climatology module [...] the book provides a broad and accessible introduction to contemporary climatology which would form a good starting point for a technically able reader to engage with the field."
- International Journey of Climatology
