Collaborative Research: Spatiotemporal variability of solar radiation partitioning in the sea ice system: Improving climate models using observations from the MOSAiC field campaign

改善北极气候预测对社会至关重要。它们需要适应和规划北极和地球其他地区现在和未来的变化。气候模式显示，随着温室气体浓度的增加，气温升高和北极海冰的减少将继续下去。然而，这些模型在变暖和海冰损失的速度上显示出很大的差异。这些模式差异很大程度上来自于对大气、海冰和海洋之间相互作用的不完全描述。其中一个关键的相互作用是海冰对阳光的反射。在春天，海冰被雪覆盖，反射85%的阳光，保持表面凉爽。然而，进入夏季，冰融化，反射的阳光减少，使表面变暖，导致更多的融化。在模型中准确地表示这个过程是至关重要的。该项目将结合观测和气候模式，更好地模拟控制阳光和海冰相互作用的过程及其对海冰融化的影响。这种建模的努力将导致气候模型中海冰的精确表示，这将改善对海冰损失和全球变暖的预测。该项目将利用北极气候研究多学科漂流观测站（MOSAiC）野外活动（2019年10月至2020年9月）的观测结果，通过分析相关的、面向过程的观测结果，改进模拟海冰物理和反馈的关键参数化，以提高气候模式的预测技能。它将侧重于建立更准确地表示冰反照率反馈过程变异性的模型参数化。方法包括时空协调的野外观测综合、单列模式和全球气候模式。我们将综合现场观测数据，生成一个完整的强迫/测试数据集，并通过单列建模迭代，开发参数化，以改善雪和融池的空间分布、海冰的透光率以及对夏季降雪和雨雪事件等事件的响应。参数化将被纳入一个开源社区气候模型，并用于评估海冰可预测性的改进。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Improved Arctic climate predictions are critical for society. They are needed to adapt to and plan for present and future change, both in the Arctic and for the rest of the planet. Climate models show that warming temperatures and Arctic sea ice loss will continue with increasing greenhouse gas concentrations. However, these models show large differences in the rate of warming and sea ice loss. These model differences largely come from imperfect representation of the interactions among the atmosphere, sea ice, and ocean. One of the key interactions is the reflection of sunlight by sea ice. In the spring, sea ice is snow-covered and reflects 85% of sunlight keeping the surface cool. However, moving into summer, the ice melts and the amount of sunlight reflected decreases, warming the surface resulting in more melt. It is critical to accurately represent this process in models. This project will combine observations and climate models to better simulate the processes controlling the interaction of sunlight and sea ice and their impact on sea ice melt. This modeling effort will lead to refined representation of sea ice in climate models, which will improve predictions of sea ice loss and global warming.This project will use observations from the Multidisciplinary drifting Observatory for the Study of Arctic Climate (MOSAiC) field campaign (Oct 2019 - Sept 2020) to improve key parameterizations for simulating sea ice physics and feedbacks through the analysis of relevant, process-oriented observations to enhance the predictive skill of climate models. It will focus on building model parameterizations that more accurately represent the variability of ice-albedo feedback processes. The methods include the integration of spatially and temporally coordinated field observations, single column modeling, and global climate modeling. We will synthesize field observations to produce a complete forcing/test dataset and iterate with single column modeling to develop parameterizations that improve the treatment of the spatial distribution of snow and melt ponds, light transmittance through sea ice, and responses to events such as summer snowfall and rain-on-snow events. Parameterizations will be incorporated in an open-source community climate model and used to evaluate improvements in sea ice predictability.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.