TOGA: Convective Rainfall in COARE Cloud Systems: Integrating the Upper Tropospheric Aircraft Data

本研究的重点是将来自对流层上层飞机（主要是NASA DC-8）的某些数据整合到TOGA- COARE（热带海洋全球大气；海洋-大气耦合响应实验）密集观测阵列的复合数据集中。热带云系统内部的粒度分布、温度、湿度和风的定量数据是COARE研究的重要内容。这些数据的贡献将通过与其他飞机的飞行计划密切协调而最大化，这些飞机将同时获得多普勒雷达数据。DC-8将首先用于定量描述COARE云团的对流层上层特征。这些数据集将与COARE船外和其他飞机的数据结合使用，以检验对流上升气流强度的微小差异可能与水成物含量和粒度分布的巨大不同的垂直剖面有关的假设。如果这是真的，潜热和辐射热廓线将受到很大影响。将这些发现放在中尺度对流系统类型和生命周期阶段的背景下是很重要的。这项工作的结果将有助于为云模型和辐射传输模型提供“基础真相”。该研究还将利用DC-8上的有源和无源微波传感器提供的前所未有的机会，这些传感器在其他平台的密集观测阵列中运行。这项研究包括解释DC-8的被动微波辐射计数据的降雨率，并将这些降雨估计提供给其他COARE研究人员。这项研究很重要，因为它是TOGA COARE对对流尺度物理过程的研究之一，可以与影响世界上一个特别气候敏感地区的变率的更大尺度联系起来，西太平洋，TOGA COARE的实地站点。

This research will center on integrating certain data from upper tropospheric aircraft, primarily the NASA DC-8, into the composite data set for the intensive observing array for TOGA- COARE (Tropical Ocean Global Atmosphere; Coupled Ocean-Atmosphere Response Experiment). There is a great need for quantitative data on particle size distribution, temperature, moisture and wind data from the interior of the tropical cloud systems in COARE. The contribution of these data will be maximized by close coordination with the flight plans of the other aircraft, which will be obtaining simultaneous Doppler radar data. The DC-8 will be used first for quantitative description of the upper tropospheric characteristics of the COARE cloud clusters. These data sets will be used in combination with data from the COARE ship away and from the other aircraft to test the hypothesis that small differences in convective updraft strength may be associated with profoundly different vertical profiles of hydrometeor content and particle size distribution. If true, latent heating and radiative heating profiles would be greatly affected. It will be important to place the findings in the context of the type of mesoscale convective system, and stage of life cycle. The results of this work will help provide "ground truth" for cloud models and radiative transfer models. The research will also take advantage of the unprecedented opportunity presented by the active and passive microwave sensors on the DC-8 operating within the intensive array of observations from the other platforms. The research includes interpreting the passive microwave radiometer data from the DC-8 in terms of rain rate and providing these rainfall estimates to the other COARE investigators. This research is important because it is one of the TOGA COARE studies of convective scale physical processes that can be linked to larger scales that impact variability in an especially climate sensitive region of the world, the western Pacific Ocean, the field site of TOGA COARE.