A&O SCI 103
Physical Oceanography
Description: Lecture, three hours; discussion, one hour. Requisite: Mathematics 3B or 31B. Introductory course for physical sciences, life sciences, or engineering majors interested in environmental issues. Observations of temperature, salinity, density, and currents. Methods. Wind-driven and geostrophic currents. California Current and Gulf Stream. Internal waves. Surface waves and tides. Air/sea interactions. Coastal upwelling. Biological/physical interactions. El niño. Role of ocean in climate and global change. Santa Monica Bay field trip. Letter grading.
Units: 4.0
Units: 4.0
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Most Helpful Review
summer 2010 aos 103 professor brix is a pretty laid back professor. he really wants you to understand the concepts he goes over and will thoroughly try and explain/answer any questions you have during the lecture. His lectures were all power points and were available online before the day so you could print it out and not have to scribble furiously to write everything he says. he also knows how much books costs so he didn't require us to buy any books but rather it was all online. awesome! homeworks are much harder than the test questions. the homework goes over things that are more math/equation based and the exams are more for evaluating whether or not we understood the material. his exams were a few multiple choice in the beginning and then some figures we had to draw or label, then a few short answer questions. overall he is a nice professor and easy to talk to if you have any problems. unlike some professors, he will respond to your emails real quickly if you have any questions on the homework or material. definitely would try and get him again for another class if possible.
summer 2010 aos 103 professor brix is a pretty laid back professor. he really wants you to understand the concepts he goes over and will thoroughly try and explain/answer any questions you have during the lecture. His lectures were all power points and were available online before the day so you could print it out and not have to scribble furiously to write everything he says. he also knows how much books costs so he didn't require us to buy any books but rather it was all online. awesome! homeworks are much harder than the test questions. the homework goes over things that are more math/equation based and the exams are more for evaluating whether or not we understood the material. his exams were a few multiple choice in the beginning and then some figures we had to draw or label, then a few short answer questions. overall he is a nice professor and easy to talk to if you have any problems. unlike some professors, he will respond to your emails real quickly if you have any questions on the homework or material. definitely would try and get him again for another class if possible.
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Most Helpful Review
Winter 2016 - Overall, really cool subject and a good professor! I feel that I learned a ton of practical information about climate and the physical world. We talked about El Nino as it was happening and the Santa Monica Bay was used a lot as an example. I personally love learning about the earth and hope to take more of these kinds of classes. One qualm I had was the clicker quizzes at the beginning of class. They often felt a little slow and since we often didn't finish all the slides that were posted on CCLE, I wished we could have used the time more efficiently. Otherwise, the use of the clicker was actually really helpful in the long run. We covered a lot of topics that were a little more technical, but these were balanced with more qualitative information, looking at cases in different parts of the world. I would have liked to see a more quantitative analysis of these areas, but I think much of the class enjoyed these sections. As an engineering major, I found the math in this class to be extremely manageable, although I noticed that much of the class had trouble with the calculus (derivatives) and physics (forces, waves, and super-simplified fluid mechanics ideas) used. I think the professor should have either altered the class the class to be more accommodating of that relatively large group--in which case I likely would have wanted a more technical class--or perhaps just described the course differently. I found myself wishing it was more technical and there was more math, but maybe that's a different class. However, there were a few parts that were explained in a slightly confusing way, which was probably not helpful. Potential vorticity stumped a lot of people. My TA, Daniel, was great at explaining these sections.
Winter 2016 - Overall, really cool subject and a good professor! I feel that I learned a ton of practical information about climate and the physical world. We talked about El Nino as it was happening and the Santa Monica Bay was used a lot as an example. I personally love learning about the earth and hope to take more of these kinds of classes. One qualm I had was the clicker quizzes at the beginning of class. They often felt a little slow and since we often didn't finish all the slides that were posted on CCLE, I wished we could have used the time more efficiently. Otherwise, the use of the clicker was actually really helpful in the long run. We covered a lot of topics that were a little more technical, but these were balanced with more qualitative information, looking at cases in different parts of the world. I would have liked to see a more quantitative analysis of these areas, but I think much of the class enjoyed these sections. As an engineering major, I found the math in this class to be extremely manageable, although I noticed that much of the class had trouble with the calculus (derivatives) and physics (forces, waves, and super-simplified fluid mechanics ideas) used. I think the professor should have either altered the class the class to be more accommodating of that relatively large group--in which case I likely would have wanted a more technical class--or perhaps just described the course differently. I found myself wishing it was more technical and there was more math, but maybe that's a different class. However, there were a few parts that were explained in a slightly confusing way, which was probably not helpful. Potential vorticity stumped a lot of people. My TA, Daniel, was great at explaining these sections.
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