The Atmospheric Solar Tide and the Semidiurnal Heatings of the Lower Atmosphere

Abstract

The solar semidiurnal air tide is computed for an atmospheric profile (Table 1) which was proved earlier to give a satisfactory lunar tide. The profile shows no resonance and the solar tide must therefore be due solely to the semidiurnal heatings of the atmosphere. The theoretical computation is compared with recently presented statistical data to infer the necessary heating distribution with height. If the heating in the troposphere is the principal contributor, the observed solar semidiurnal tide may be explained by the eddy diffusion of heat with a coefficient of order of 10⁶cm²⋅sec-1.