The purpose of this page it to demonstrate some of the material that Dot Net Webs Limited has been involved with in previous projects. This HTML on this page has not been updated to reflect modern standards. Its purpose is simply to show the animations in their original context. For more information about Dot Net Webs Limited please visit our Home Page.
What is temperature? It sounds like an obvious question. We are all aware of the concept of "hot" and "cold", but to fully understand the role of temperature in the atmosphere we need a more precise definition of temperature.
As we have seen the gases in the atmosphere are composed of molecules. The molecules are in a constant state of vibration due to the kinetic energy they possess. Temperature may be defined as a measure of the AVERAGE kinetic energy of the individual molecules (or atoms) in a substance. When heat energy is added to a substance the molecules vibrate faster and its temperature rises. When heat energy is removed from a substance the molecules vibrate slower and its temperature falls.
Heat energy may be transferred from one substance to another. The substance with the higher temperature will lose heat energy and the substance with the lower temperature will gain energy. The transfer will continue until the two substances are in thermal equilibrium.
The simple animation below illustrates a sealed container of air. The molecules are moving at random at a rate determined by the ambient temperature.
Click on the button to add or remove heat
We have seen that the temperature of a gas determines the rate at which the molecules of that gas vibrate. The vibrating molecules exert a force upon each other, and adjacent or containing objects. This force, which is due to the kinetic energy of the molecules, is known as:
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