High-pressure area Hadley cells help form the subtropical ridge, steer tropical waves and tropical cyclones across the ocean and is strongest during the summer. The subtropical ridge also helps form most of the world's deserts. On English-language weather maps, high-pressure centers are identified by the letter H. Weather maps in other languages may use different letters or symbols. The direction of wind flow around an atmospheric high-pressure area and a low-pressure area, as seen from above, depends on the hemisphere. High-pressure systems rotate clockwise in the northern Hemisphere; low-pressure systems rotate clockwise in the southern hemisphere. The scientific terms in English used
Low-pressure area share one important aspect, that of upward vertical motion within the troposphere. Such upward motions decrease the mass of local atmospheric columns of air, which lowers surface pressure. Extratropical cyclones form as waves along weather fronts due to a passing by shortwave aloft or upper level jet streak before occluding later in their life cycle as cold-core cyclones. Polar lows are small-scale, short-lived atmospheric low-pressure systems that occur over the ocean areas poleward of the main polar front in both the Northern and Southern Hemispheres. They are part of the larger class of mesoscale weather-systems. Polar lows can be difficult