This book collects most of the talks and poster presentations presented at the Optical Turbulence OCo Astronomy meets Meteorology international conference held on 15OCo18 September, 2008 at Nymphes Bay, Alghero, Sardinia, Italy. The meeting aimed to deal with one of the major causes of wavefront perturbations limiting the astronomical high-angular-resolution observations from the ground. The uniqueness of this meeting has been the effort to attack this topic in a synergic and multidisciplinary approach promoting constructive discussions between the actors of this science OCo the astronomers, meteorologists, physicists of the atmosphere and the experts in adaptive optics and interferometry techniques whose main goal is to correct, in real-time, the wavefront perturbations induced by atmospheric turbulence to restore at the telescope foci the best available image quality. Sample Chapter(s). Chapter 1: Optical Turbulence in High Angular Resolution Techniques in Astronomy (494 KB). Contents: Optical Turbulence in High Angular Resolution Techniques in Astronomy (J M Beckers); Optical Turbulence Profiles at CTIO from a 12-Element Lunar Scintillometer (P Hickson et al.); High Resolution SLODAR Measurements on Mauna Kea (T Butterley et al.); How We Can Understand the Antarctic Atmospheric? (J W V Storey et al.); The Paranal Surface Layar (J Melnick et al.); Introduction to Data Assimilation in Meteorology (P Brousseau OC L Auger); The Mauna Kea Weather Center: A Case for Custom Seeing Forecasts (T Cherubini et al.); Dealing with Turbulence: MCAO Experience and Beyond (R Ragazzoni et al.); Future-Look Science Operations for the LBT (R F Green); Surface Layer SLODAR (J Osborn et al.); and other papers. Readership: Advanced undergraduates and graduate students, and physicists working in the field of astronomy.

The book gives a comprehensive and lucid account of the science of the atmospheric boundary layer (ABL). There is an emphasis on the application of the ABL to numerical modelling of the climate. The book comprises nine chapters, several appendices (data tables, information sources, physical constants) and an extensive reference list. Chapter 1 serves as an introduction, with chapters 2 and 3 dealing with the development of mean and turbulence equations, and the many scaling laws and theories that are the cornerstone of any serious ABL treatment. Modelling of the ABL is crucially dependent for its realism on the surface boundary conditions, and chapters 4 and 5 deal with aerodynamic and energy considerations, with attention to both dry and wet land surfaces and sea. The structure of the clear-sky, thermally stratified ABL is treated in chapter 6, including the convective and stable cases over homogeneous land, the marine ABL and the internal boundary layer at the coastline. Chapter 7 then extends the discussion to the cloudy ABL. This is seen as particularly relevant, since the extensive stratocumulus regions over the subtropical oceans and stratus regions over the Arctic are now identified as key players in the climate system. Finally, chapters 8 and 9 bring much of the book's material together in a discussion of appropriate ABL and surface parameterization schemes in general circulation models of the atmosphere that are being used for climate simulation.

This text gives a simple view of the structure of the boundary layer, the instruments available for measuring its mean and turbulent properties, how best to make the measurements, and ways to process and analyze the data.

A full-scale planetary boundary layer field experiment was conducted jointly by members of the Air Force Cambridge Research Laboratories, the Meteorological Research Unit, Royal Air Force, Cardington, England, and the Air Weather Service in late summer of 1973 in northwestern Minnesota. Direct measurements of vertical transport of momentum and heat, as well as vertical profiles of wind velocity and temperature, were obtained to altitudes of 1220 meters. Measurements were made from sensors mounted on a tower and on the cable of a barrage balloon. The data obtained for all the fully convective periods are presented in this report.

Part of the excitement in boundary-layer meteorology is the challenge associated with turbulent flow - one of the unsolved problems in classical physics. An additional attraction of the filed is the rich diversity of topics and research methods that are collected under the umbrella-term of boundary-layer meteorology. The flavor of the challenges and the excitement associated with the study of the atmospheric boundary layer are captured in this textbook. Fundamental concepts and mathematics are presented prior to their use, physical interpretations of the terms in equations are given, sample data are shown, examples are solved, and exercises are included. The work should also be considered as a major reference and as a review of the literature, since it includes tables of parameterizatlons, procedures, filed experiments, useful constants, and graphs of various phenomena under a variety of conditions. It is assumed that the work will be used at the beginning graduate level for students with an undergraduate background in meteorology, but the author envisions, and has catered for, a heterogeneity in the background and experience of his readers.