U.S.-China Cooperative Research (Meteorology): Atmospheric Front-Boundary Layer Processes

地球大气与地面之间的相互作用主要局限于相对较薄的大气层（约1公里深），即行星边界层。有一些观测资料，主要是在大气的最低几百米，描绘了伴随锋面通过的风、温度和湿度的分布。锋面经常伴有恶劣天气：有必要诊断与锋面相关的物理过程，并预测其运动和严重程度。然而，很少有模型可以提供一个基本的概念框架，在这个框架上分析在额叶通道中所获得的低水平观测。拟议的研究旨在发展一个行星边界层模型，该模型可用于分析伴随大气锋通过的气象变量。可用的数据将用于评估不同物理过程的相对重要性，并将模型简化为易于分析的形式。中华人民共和国的仪器气象塔测量和美国中西部的国家天气实验（STORM）观测阵列（1992年冬季）预计将提供独立的数据。这些数据可用于验证模式预测，并改进模式，以便在行星边界研究中作为诊断工具使用。这项工作与1990年代与风暴有关的活动以及南京大学强中尺度实验室目前正在进行的工作特别相关。

Interaction between the earth's atmosphere and the ground is primarily confined to a relatively thin atmospheric layer (about 1 km deep, the planetary boundary layer. There are observations available, primarily in the lowest few hundred meters of the atmosphere, that depict the distribution of wind, temperature and humidity that accompany the passage of a front. Fronts are often accompanied by severe weather: there is a need to diagnose the physical processes that are associated with fronts, and to predict their movement and severity. Yet there are few if any models, that can provide a fundamental conceptual framework upon which to analyze low-level observations taken during frontal passages. The proposed research is designed to develop a planetary boundary layer model that may be used for the analysis of meteorological variables that accompany the passage of an atmospheric front. Available data will be used to evaluate the relative importance of different physical processes, and to reduce the model to a form that is amenable to analysis. Independent data are expected to be available from instrumented meteorological tower measurements in the People's Republic of China, and from the U.S. National Weather Experiment (STORM) observational array in the mid-west (during the winter of 1992). These data may be used to verify model predictions, and to refine the model for use as a diagnostic tool in planetary boundary studies. This work is particularly relevant to STORM related activities during the 1990's and to work presently being carried out in the Severe Meso-Scale Laboratory of Nanjing University.