Related topics: greenhouse gases ยท climate change

Geomagnetic field protects Earth from electron showers

Understanding the ionosphere high in the Earth's atmosphere is important due to its effects on communications systems, satellites and crucial chemical features including the ozone layer. New insights into the activity of ...

Scientists study how planetary waves affect atmospheric dynamics

Physicists at St Petersburg University have studied planetary waves and discovered that they can generate disturbances in the stratosphere causing extreme warming and cooling in the Arctic and mid-latitudes. Numerical modeling ...

Without ozone, the Earth might get a lot colder

The evolution of Earth's climate contains many components. And new research has shown just how critical the ozone layer is to the surface temperature of the Earth. Without an ozone layer, our planet would be 3.5 Kelvin cooler.

page 1 from 25

Ozone layer

The ozone layer is a layer in Earth's atmosphere which contains relatively high concentrations of ozone (O3). This layer absorbs 93-99% of the sun's high frequency ultraviolet light, which is potentially damaging to life on earth. Over 91% of the ozone in Earth's atmosphere is present here. It is mainly located in the lower portion of the stratosphere from approximately 10 km to 50 km above Earth, though the thickness varies seasonally and geographically. The ozone layer was discovered in 1913 by the French physicists Charles Fabry and Henri Buisson. Its properties were explored in detail by the British meteorologist G. M. B. Dobson, who developed a simple spectrophotometer (the Dobsonmeter) that could be used to measure stratospheric ozone from the ground. Between 1928 and 1958 Dobson established a worldwide network of ozone monitoring stations which continues to operate today. The "Dobson unit", a convenient measure of the total amount of ozone in a column overhead, is named in his honor.

This text uses material from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA