Summary
The greenhouse effect was discovered nearly two centuries ago but its significance to planetary environments was only discovered during the early years of space exploration. We will review how the greenhouse effect works in planetary atmospheres and how increasing levels of carbon dioxide alters climate. We will then introduce a relative new area of statistics, known as the theory of record-breaking events. Using these new methods of analysis together with accurate atmospheric temperature data confirms that global warming presents a genuine trend that cannot be dismissed owing to intrinsic randomness in the data.
Biography
Professor Newman’s astrophysical research focuses on two classes of theoretical problems. The first of these is related to star and solar system formation: his research involves the evolution of primitive stellar nebulae and the role of magnetic fields in angular momentum transfer and in forming bipolar outflows. (The nonlinear dynamics of the early solar system and the accretion of planetesimal material in the outer solar system in the presence of Jovian planets is a related area of investigation.) This work involves the development of large-scale computational simulations for these different environments. The second focus is related to the dynamics of galaxies and, especially, to the evolution of pattern at large scales. The red-shift statistics of external galaxies and clusters, as well as the evolution of power-law statistical distributions in the positions and masses of galaxies is an important clue to the formation of galaxies following the Big Bang. Theoretical, computational, and statistical methods are employed in these various extragalactic and cosmological investigations.