numerical weather prediction

Numerical weather prediction (NWP) is the prediction of the weather (typically Earth's) through the use of numerical methods to solve the relevant equations and/or simulate the atmospheric dynamics. Current weather prediction is now generally based upon such models, scaled to cover a large portion of Earth atmosphere. Such a computer model is termed a NWP model (for numerical weather prediction model). NWP's methods are borrowed by astrophysics, sometimes to the point of adapting the same software to other solar system and extra-solar planets.