Baroclinic instability

Baroclinic instability is a situation that results from the tight thermal gradients when air parcels are unstable to slantwise forcing.

Adiabatic lapse rate
Atmospheric thermodynamics
Baroclinic instability
Barotropic instability
Barotropic vorticity equation
David Bates (physicist)
Convective instability ...

Terminology in the literature is confusing, chiefly because cyclonic-scale disturbances at low levels are frequently associated with large-scale disturbances in the high troposphere. See barotropic instability, baroclinic instability.

(See Helmholtz instability, inertial instability, shearing instability, baroclinic instability, barotropic instability, rotational instability.) The space scale of unstable waves is important in meteorology: Thus Helmholtz, baroclinic, ...

See also: Baroclinic, Barotropic, Earth, Meteorology, Meteor