The semidiurnal air-temperature variation and the solar air tide

The world wide distribution of the semidiurnal variation of the surface air temperature is analyzed, separately for the standing and the migrating temperature wave. The results of this analysis are applied to a discussion of the semidiurnal pressure wave. It is shown that the form of the observed standing semidiurnal pressure wave is such as would be expected on the basis of the resonance theory, including a term which is antisymmetrical to the equator because of the differences in land and water distribution in the northern and southern hemisphere. An other large antisymmetrical term in the migrating diurnal temperature wave does not appear in the semidiurnal migrating pressure wave becaus…