The Earth’s atmosphere is 78.08 percent nitrogen, 20 95 percent oxygen, 0 93 percent argon, and 0.03 percent carbon dioxide.

Atmospheric Zones
Layer
Height (above
Earth’s surface)
Troposphere Temperature
5 miles at poles; 7 miles at
mid-latitudes; 10 miles What do we know?
at Equator
Drops 3.6 °F every 1,000 ft up;
minimum reaches -70°F
Contains 75% of the total mass of the
Stratosphere atmosphere. This is where life and almost
all of our weather is found. The top of the
30 miles troposphere is called the tropopause
Stable at around -58°F

Mesosphere Contains 24% of the total mass of the atmosphere.

At the bottom of the stratrosphere is the ozone layer
50 miles
Decreases from 20°F at base to -166°F,
before rising again at top

Meteors burn up in this zone to give “shooting stars;”

together with the thermosphere, this layer contains
Thermosphere many ionized particles, and they are collectively termed
the ionosphere--this is the layer off which radio signals
400 miles bounce to allow radio telecommunications

Exophere: Variable; can reach 441°F

togehter with thermosphere,
makes up “outer atmosphere” Gets so hot because the thin atmosphere reabsorbs a
lot of radiation that bounces back from the lower layers
Up to 40,000 miles
Fall to near zero
The atmospheric density at 6,000 miles is the same as
outer space. Above this height, it is only the “atmosphere”
in the sense that the Earth’s gravitational and magnetic
field exert some influence. The exosphere contains the
magnetosphere, where the aurorae appear