The color bands of relative humidity roughly parallel the saturated vaporpressure curve, diverging towards the warmer temperature. Relating allthis to everyday experience. Students begin withthe vapor pressure versus temperature scatterplot created in part 2. Examine the graph. Set the color bar scale so that data points representing times of some rainare clearly differentiated from data points representing times of no rain.
Students examine scatterplot.
We have learned thatprecipitation or condensation may occur when a parcel of air coolssuffiently that it reaches the saturated vapor curve OR when the watervapor of a parcel of air increases so that it reaches the saturated vapor curve. Our measurements were made at the earth's surface, not up in theclouds. Look at a week of data at a time. When trying to figure out why datadiffer from predictions, it's often useful to think about the variations intime and space within the data set. They are told to try toalter the temperature at which moisture first appear on the outside of thebeaker, i.e. the dewpoint.