When you are by the sea, you will no doubt be amazed at the strength of the sea, its frenetic pace, its enormous size and depth. You must have wondered how marine animals feel when surrounded by water. Thousands of feet below you will find crabs and other forms of marine life that run along the seabed. The enormous pressure there would crush a human, but the bodies of these animals are made to tolerate it.
Have you thought about the fact that humans actually live in an "ocean" of air? We do. It is much deeper, about fifty times deeper than the depths of the ocean. It is subject to more sudden temperature changes and is more restless than the watery oceans. Huge air currents with a width of several hundred kilometers and a depth of several kilometers move at heights of ten to twelve kilometers above the earth's surface. They are known as "jet streams" and blow at speeds of up to 500 kilometers per hour. So there are violent storms that constantly destroy the various layers of this "sea" of air. We know the gigantic forces that are released in hurricanes and tornadoes. In addition, about 44,000 impressive storms occur every day in the large and rough "sea" that surrounds us.
Air has substance and weight
Air is invisible, but it has substance. Because of this, our atmosphere puts significant pressure on the earth's surface, of course not as large as the ocean, because the air is not as heavy as water. However, the air has weight, as evidenced by the fact that a balloon filled with helium rises. Because helium is lighter than air, air pushes it upwards, just like a bubble in a glass of water shoots. The average atmospheric pressure at sea level is about seven kilograms per square inch (6.5 square centimeters). At higher altitudes it becomes less dense and therefore lighter. But our "sea" of air is so large that it weighs more than 5,000,000,000,000,000,000 (five quadrillion) tons.
The weight of the air means that there is a lot of weight on the shoulders at sea level. But you do not realize why pressure also comes from all sides of the body. To compensate for this external compression, the body maintains internal pressure, just as the bodies of marine animals have internal pressure to balance the enormous external pressure in the water around them. This inner pressure that humans have when they are "at home" in the Earth's atmosphere forces them to wear pressure clothing when they are "away from home" in space. Otherwise, the lungs and blood vessels explode in an almost spatial vacuum.
When you have strong winds, you are convinced that the air has substance. And all doubt about it definitely disappears when you are in a laboratory and see how it turns into a liquid at -190 degrees Celsius and a solid at -236 degrees F. (VS). .).
In fact, we can "see" air even in its normal gaseous form when differences in heat cause it to act as a "lens". Air, densely concentrated in some places and finely concentrated in others, distorts light rays so that we can see illusions - reflection and refraction of light from things that are sometimes miles away. The waves we see in a hot radiator give us a small example of this phenomenon.
A valuable property of air is that it is expansive. Water in normal liquid form partially fills a container. But air molecules move much more freely and quickly, generally above the speed of sound.Only earth's gravity prevents air from escaping and diffusing into empty space. As the size of the room decreases, the air molecules increase in speed and provide resistance that creates pressure. This property is very useful. Liquids cannot be compressed significantly, but compressors can "pack" a large amount of air in a small container so that when released they can operate pneumatic presses, drills, jacks. air, etc.
Important for life in many ways
However, we are primarily interested in air because of its importance to life on this planet. The main component of lifelong air is oxygen, which is only 21% by volume (atmosphere), that is, gases produced in relatively constant proportions.
Oxygen easily combines with other elements or compounds to create combustion. Therefore, when a piece of wood is burnt, it rusts quickly. Our body heat is maintained by the body's metabolism during the oxidation of nutrients. This process also supplies energy to the brain, muscle energy, etc. This is one of the reasons why red blood cells, the oxygen carriers in the blood, are so important and why brain cells, which use about a quarter of the body's total oxygen supply, need of this constantly renewed element. . Oxygen is so active that fires start with a spark and virtually anything would burn if it wasn't diluted with other gases in the atmosphere. In addition, no one would live long and breathe only pure oxygen.
But for our existence and our safety, the Creator diluted the atmosphere with nitrogen, which makes up 78% of the “relatively constant” gases that make up the atmosphere. So we have enough oxygen and it is not very concentrated. In our atmospheric “ocean”, nitrogen and oxygen together make up 99% of these relatively constant gases. However, nitrogen is more of a diluent. It serves other purposes. During a thunderstorm, thunder allows nitrogen to combine with other elements. The rain then carries the resulting compounds into the soil as fertilizer. It is an important element for many plants.
But even in less than one percent of other atmospheric gases we find gases that are vital or contribute a lot to our comfort. There are five quasi-inert gases, known as “rare gases”: argon, neon, helium, krypton and xenon. We all know about the uses of argon and neon in lighting, helium in balloons, and many other uses. Methane, hydrogen and nitrous oxide are other gases in the atmosphere that are present in almost constant concentrations.
Water vapor, ozone, dust: important components
In addition to gases which vary in quantity, other gases are also present in the atmosphere in different proportions depending on time and place. Two of them are water vapor from 0 to 7% by volume and carbon dioxide from 0.01 to 1%. Plants take in carbon dioxide and give off oxygen. Without carbon dioxide, plant life would die. Ozone, a form or "allotrope" of oxygen, is also present in small amounts, making up only about 0.01% of the atmosphere. It is usually between ten and fifty kilometers and offers protection against deadly ultraviolet rays. Who, apart from an all-powerful and all-powerful Creator, could have created a similar atmosphere for the benefit of all living things on earth, with elements in the right proportions for maximum safety, comfort and well-being for everyone?
Like a gas in the atmosphere, water vapor is the source of rain, fog, snow, hail, and hail. It constitutes a large part of the clouds. Water vapor is created by the sun's evaporation from water in seas and lakes as well as from leaves. Without this cycle of rain and evaporation, plant life would soon die off the earth.
In addition to the small percentages of sulfur dioxide and nitrogen dioxide, there are solid particles such as dust, smoke soot, sea salt, pollen, microbes, and meteorite ash that are created when they burn in the atmosphere. Dust, unless it is excessive, cannot be called "pollution" because the dust particles are important in forming the core of the raindrops and they have to do with the beautiful blue hue of the sky and the deep red. Sunset. In addition to possibly treating the illnesses of hay fever sufferers, draft-dispersed plant pollen also serves a beneficial purpose.
Temperatures in the "ocean" of the atmosphere
Most of the things discussed have to do with the layer of air we live in: the troposphere. As everyone knows, the higher the altitude, the lower the temperature. After reaching a minimum of -55 ° C in the upper part of the troposphere, the temperature rises through the stratosphere (where the jet streams meet) to -2 ° C to ° C). C) and descends to the next layer (the mesosphere) at -135 ° F (approximately -93 ° C). The temperature in the next layer, the thermosphere, rises to an altitude of about 450 kilometers to an impressive 1,500 ° C.
The ionosphere is not one of the normal atmospheric "layers", but the region (comprising several "layers") in which air molecules are electrically charged by solar radiation. The lower limit is about 55 kilometers above Earth and reaches several thousand miles in a very, very thin atmosphere. The beautiful northern lights or "aurora borealis" (and the Australian aurora in the southern hemisphere) occurs in the ionosphere.
In the ionosphere, charged air particles that are "ionized" by solar and space radiation form a "blanket" of radio waves. This allows radio transmission over a distance of thousands of kilometers. Radio waves travel in a straight line and would reach a limited area only if the Earth were to move away from below and go directly into space. But the ceiling of the radio "bounces" in a far corner of the Earth. Satellites are now used in the same way.
Through the use of satellites and more complex instruments, this has led to a better understanding of our "ocean" from the air. We know much more about its currents, temperatures, etc. Therefore, weather forecasts are becoming more and more accurate. However, humans still need to learn a lot about the atmosphere, which, although in a very weakened state, spans several rays from Earth (one ray from Earth = 6,372 kilometers) in space. Many of its secrets are still hidden, and with the expansion of space exploration, new ones are emerging.
Very interesting topic.