Final answer:
Warm fronts have a gentle and gradual leading edge, resulting in an extensive and less intense area of cloud cover and precipitation compared to cold fronts. Thermodynamics plays a central role in understanding these weather changes.
Step-by-step explanation:
Warm fronts typically have a gentle and gradual leading edge. Unlike cold fronts, which have a steeper edge due to denser cold air pushing underneath warmer air, warm fronts occur when warmer, lighter air advances over cooler, denser air. The movement of a warm front leads to an extensive cloud cover and precipitation that can extend over a larger area but is generally less intense than with cold fronts.
The approach of a warm front often brings about a noticeable change in temperature and can cause extensive condensation resulting in weather patterns like the one mentioned in the reference information, where a cold front pushed smog to form a blanket over the Yellow Sea.
The knowledge of thermodynamics is crucial to understanding weather changes, as it explains the energy transfer associated with temperature changes during the interaction of different air masses. Warm fronts are also associated with specific types of clouds, such as cirrus, cirrostratus, and eventually nimbostratus as the front nears.