There's a lot more to the atmosphere than meets the eye.
When you look at photographs of Earth from space, the planet looks like a blue marble, with patterns of clouds lying on the surface of the marble. It seems as if Earth's atmosphere is incredibly thin, wrapped tightly around our planet. In fact, the atmosphere consists of multiple layers, with some scientists of the opinion that the atmosphere extends halfway to the Moon. The Layers of Earth's Atmosphere It's easy to imagine Earth's atmosphere as a bubble of air surrounding the planet that abruptly ends with the vacuum of space. The reality is a lot more complex than that. Our planet's atmosphere is made up of a series of layers, each with its own characteristics. Troposphere (5 – 9 Miles Thick) The troposphere is the layer closest to Earth's surface and is what most of us are probably imagining when we talk about the atmosphere. Tropos is Greek for "change," so it literally means "sphere of change" which is an accurate description. In this layer, atmospheric changes constantly occur, including almost all of our planet's weather. Despite being the smallest layer, nearly all the water vapor in our atmosphere is found in the troposphere. If you've ever wondered why it's always sunny when you're cruising at altitude in a plane, it's because you've left the troposphere behind, along with most clouds. In the troposphere, air becomes thinner the higher you get. With lower air pressure, the temperature drops, so the higher you go in the troposphere, the colder it gets. Stratosphere (22 Miles hick) Phrases such as "taking off into the stratosphere" make it sound like this must be the highest level of the atmosphere, but it's actually the second lowest. Stratum is Latin for "layer," so this is literally the sphere of layers. It gets its name due to the layers of temperature within this zone. Ozone in the stratosphere absorbs energy from the sun in the form of ultraviolet (UV) radiation, which is then radiated as heat. Unlike the troposphere, where the temperature…