Many of the most pressing problems in environmental science, such as El Nino, the ozone hole, and global warming intimately involve the motions of the atmosphere and the oceans. Students and faculty in ATOC approach the study of the dynamics of atmospheres and oceans from several perspectives. Field programs that employ fixed arrays of instruments, or highly instrumented platforms such as research ships, research aircraft, satellites, and remote pilotless drones, generate data sets that reveal new dynamic phenomena, or which may be used to test theoretical ideas or models. Computational simulations are used to explore the interactions between fluid motions and various physical/chemical processes that are now recognized as being closely coupled to dynamics. Models of global phenomena permit close-up study of the mechanisms that may govern the complicated behavior observed both in the models themselves and in nature. Research in the fundamental theory of waves, instabilities, and turbulence is carried out using idealized analytical study, and by the construction of mechanistic or process models that attempt to isolate key interactions for detailed interpretation. Laboratory experiments in fluid instability and turbulence are yet another point of view, yielding data from controlled systems run at parameter settings well beyond those accessible through direct numerical simulation. Finally, investigations of the circulations of other planetary atmospheres, as well as large-scale motions the solar atmosphere, provide an interesting test of theories and ideas about dynamical behavior at conditions far removed from those prevalent on Earth.