Climate Feedbacks in the Antarctic from Stratospheric Balloon GPS Radio Occultation Soundings

同化来自IASI和AIRS卫星辐射的卫星载高分辨率红外（IR）探测数据的新努力，提供了更多关于高空温度和湿度的信息。这些努力有可能大大提高数值天气预报（NWP）模式对南半球采样不足大气的预报和再分析产品的技术。这是美国儿科学会支持的国际家庭年项目CONCORDIASI活动的主要目标之一。然而，由于云污染和南极环境特有的地表发射率不确定性，在红外剖面中仍然存在显著的偏差。本研究旨在利用GPS无线电掩星剖面技术提高全球和区域再分析的质量，这些技术是由春季极地涡旋环绕南极洲的平流层气球平台制成的。该研究旨在减少卫星探测观测中的偏差，并发展将气球GPS RO剖面直接吸收到NWP模型中的能力。改进的卫星探测或气球载GPS无线电掩星剖面，将有助于我们对南半球温度、湿度和环流特征的描述，这些特征有助于我们更好地理解臭氧消耗等现象，以及南半球环状模态（SAM）极性的工作原理。极地气候系统未来演变的不确定性限制了我们预测全球气候变率和变化的能力。

New efforts to assimilate satellite borne, high-resolution infrared (IR) sounding data from IASI and AIRS satellite radiances are providing much denser information on upper air temperature and humidity. Such efforts have the potential to greatly improve the skill of numerical weather prediction (NWP) model forecast and reanalysis products for the undersampled atmosphere of the southern hemisphere. This is one of the key aims of the CONCORDIASI campaign, a USAP supported IPY project. However, significant biases remain in the IR profiles due to cloud contamination and surface emissivity uncertainties that are specific to the Antarctic environment. This study seeks to improve the quality of global and regional reanalyses using GPS radio occultation profiling techniques made from stratospheric balloon platforms encircling Antarctica in the spring polar vortex. The study is intended to reduce biases in the satellite sounding observations, and to develop the capability for assimilating the balloon GPS RO profiles directly into NWP models.Improved satellite soundings, or balloon borne GPS radio occultation profiling, will help our characterization of southern hemisphere temperature, moisture and circulation features needed for better understanding of phenomena such as ozone depletion, and the workings of the polarity of the Southern Hemisphere annular mode (SAM). Uncertainty as to the future evolution of the climate systems in the polar regions limits our ability to project global climate variability and change.