Smagorinsky, J., 1972: The general circulation of the atmosphere. In Meteorological Challenges: A History, Ottawa: Information Canada, 3-42.

Abstract: An awareness of a global scale circulation and attempts to account for the few observed characteristics can be traced back to the seventeenth century. Up until a century ago explanations centered about the symmetric circulation, whereas the essential role of wave disturbances--how they are excited, their energetics and their non-linear characteristics--evolved only recently as aerological observations became available and more powerful theoretical tools were developed. The total fabric was spun from the discovery of fundamental mechanisms governing the large scale flows, such as geostrophy, the conservation of absolute vorticity and baroclinic instability, and their application to the study of such characteristic phenomena as fronts, cyclones and the index cycle.An awareness of a global scale circulation and attempts to account for the few observed characteristics can be traced back to the seventeenth century. Up until a century ago explanations centered about the symmetric circulation, whereas the essential role of wave disturbances--how they are excited, their energetics and their non-linear characteristics--evolved only recently as aerological observations became available and more powerful theoretical tools were developed. The total fabric was spun from the discovery of fundamental mechanisms governing the large scale flows, such as geostrophy, the conservation of absolute vorticity and baroclinic instability, and their application to the study of such characteristic phenomena as fronts, cyclones and the index cycle. Our understanding of interactions involving the tropics, the stratosphere and the lower boundary is still developing, permitting the construction of more sophisticated and comprehensive numerical models with considerable simulative capability. The most clearly promising prospects for the future come from the application of such models to long range prediction and climatic change.