Earth's Atmosphere and Its Layers

2. Earth's Atmosphere and Its Layers Figure 9. Atmospheric Layers (Source: gurupendidikan.co.id) The atmosphere is the layer of air that protects the earth. Air in the atmosphere is composed of nitrogen (78%), oxygen (21%), argon (0.9%), carbon dioxide (0.03%), and the remaining gases. other. Some of the functions of the atmosphere are to protect the earth from solar radiation, protect the earth from celestial objects falling to earth, and reduce the temperature difference between day and night. The atmosphere has several layers with a thickness of up to 1000 km, measured from above sea level, and weighs 6 billion tons. Based on the layer criteria, several atmospheric layer nomenclatures are known, namely temperature, ionization, magnetic field, propagation, and technical. Vertically (temperature), the atmosphere consists of: - Toposphere Figure 10. Troposphere (Source: Wikipedia) In this layer, weather symptoms such as clouds, lightning, typhoons, storms and rain occur. In this layer, the temperature also decreases with each increase in altitude because the troposphere only absorbs a small amount of the sun's shortwave radiation. The air in the upper troposphere is very cold, so it is heavier than the air above the tropopause, as a result the tropospheric air cannot penetrate the tropopause. The tropopause is the layer of air between the troposphere and the stratosphere. - Stratosphere Figure 11. Stratosphere (Source: Wikipedia) The atmospheric layer is above the tropopause. The air temperature in this layer will increase (hotter) as the altitude increases. This temperature increase is caused by the ozone layer which absorbs ultra violet radiation from the sun. Upper stratosphere bounded by the surface of the stratopause. The Stratopause is located at an altitude of 60 km with a temperature of 0o C. - Mesosphere Figure 12. Mesosphere (Source: Wikipedia) The mesosphere is characterized by a decrease in temperature of 0.4o C for every 100 meter increase in height, because this layer has a negative radiation balance. The air here will cause friction with objects coming from space and produce high temperatures. Most meteors that reach Earth burn up in this layer. The part above the mesosphere is limited by the mesopause, which is the layer in the atmosphere that has the lowest temperature, approximately -100 oC. The height is about 85 km. - Thermosphere Figure 13. Thermosphere (Source: Wikipedia) In this layer there is a fairly high temperature increase, namely around 1982° C. This change occurs due to the absorption of ultra violet radiation. This layer is also called the ionosphere because in this layer the gases will experience ionization.