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Clouds, aerosol, and precipitation in the Marine Boundary Layer: An ARM mobile facility deployment

Journal Article · · Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society
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  1. Univ. of Washington, Seattle, WA (United States)
  2. Brookhaven National Lab. (BNL), Upton, NY (United States)
  3. Columbia Univ., New York, NY (United States)
  4. McGill Univ., Montreal, QC (Canada)
  5. Oregon State Univ., Corvallis, OR (United States)
  6. North Carolina State Univ., Raleigh, NC (United States)
  7. Univ. of Kansas, Lawrence, KS (United States)
  8. Univ. of Reading, Reading (United Kingdom)
  9. Univ. of Reading, Reading (United Kingdom); Finnish Meteorological Institute (Finland)
  10. Univ. of North Dakota, Grand Forks, ND (United States)
  11. Rutgers Univ., New Brunswick, NJ (United States)
  12. NOAA CIRES, Boulder, CO (United States)
  13. State Univ. of New York, Albany, NY (United States)
  14. NASA Langley Research Center, Hampton, VA (United States)
  15. Science Systems and Applications, Inc., Hampton, VA (United States)
  16. Univ. of Miami, Coral Gables, FL (United States)
  17. National Center for Atmospheric Research, Boulder, CO (United States)
  18. Tsinghua Univ., Beijing (China)
+ Show Author Affiliations
The Clouds, Aerosol, and Precipitation in the Marine Boundary Layer (CAP-MBL) deployment at Graciosa Island in the Azores generated a 21-month (April 2009-December 2010) comprehensive dataset documenting clouds, aerosols, and precipitation using the Atmospheric Radiation Measurement Program (ARM) Mobile Facility (AMF). The scientific aim of the deployment is to gain improved understanding of the interactions of clouds, aerosols, and precipitation in the marine boundary layer. Graciosa Island straddles the boundary between the subtropics and midlatitudes in the Northeast Atlantic Ocean and consequently experiences a great diversity of meteorological and cloudiness conditions. Low clouds are the dominant cloud type, with stratocumulus and cumulus occurring regularly. Approximately half of all clouds contained precipitation detectable as radar echoes below the cloud base. Radar and satellite observations show that clouds with tops from 1-11 km contribute more or less equally to surface-measured precipitation at Graciosa. A wide range of aerosol conditions was sampled during the deployment consistent with the diversity of sources as indicated by back-trajectory analysis. Preliminary findings suggest important two-way interactions between aerosols and clouds at Graciosa, with aerosols affecting light precipitation and cloud radiative properties while being controlled in part by precipitation scavenging.The data from Graciosa are being compared with short-range forecasts made with a variety of models. A pilot analysis with two climate and two weather forecast models shows that they reproduce the observed time-varying vertical structure of lower-tropospheric cloud fairly well but the cloud-nucleating aerosol concentrations less well. The Graciosa site has been chosen to be a permanent fixed ARM site that became operational in October 2013.
Research Organization:
Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL), Upton, NY (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE Office of Science (SC), Biological and Environmental Research (BER) (SC-23)
OSTI ID:
1201336
Alternate ID(s):
OSTI ID: 1255441
OSTI ID: 1391809
Report Number(s):
BNL--107832-2015-JA; KP1701000
Journal Information:
Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, Journal Name: Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society Journal Issue: 3 Vol. 96; ISSN 0003-0007
Publisher:
American Meteorological SocietyCopyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English

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Cited By (28)

Investigation of the marine boundary layer cloud and CCN properties under coupled and decoupled conditions over the Azores: MBL CLOUD AND CCN PROPERTIES journal June 2015
Quantifying cloud base updraft speeds of marine stratocumulus from cloud top radiative cooling journal November 2016
Assessment of marine boundary layer cloud simulations in the CAM with CLUBB and updated microphysics scheme based on ARM observations from the Azores: MBL CLOUDS IN CAM-CLUBB-MG2 VERSUS ARM OBSERVATIONS journal July 2016
Low-CCN concentration air masses over the eastern North Atlantic: Seasonality, meteorology, and drivers: LOW-CCN AIR MASSES AT THE AZORES journal January 2017
Using MODIS cloud regimes to sort diagnostic signals of aerosol-cloud-precipitation interactions: AEROSOL-CLOUD-PRECIPITATION INTERACTIONS journal May 2017
A Case Study in Low Aerosol Number Concentrations Over the Eastern North Atlantic: Implications for Pristine Conditions in the Remote Marine Boundary Layer journal November 2017
A cloudy planetary boundary layer oscillation arising from the coupling of turbulence with precipitation in climate simulations journal August 2017
Land-ocean differences in the warm-rain formation process in satellite and ground-based observations and model simulations: Land-Ocean Differences in Warm Rain
  • Takahashi, Hanii; Suzuki, Kentaroh; Stephens, Graeme
  • Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society, Vol. 143, Issue 705 https://doi.org/10.1002/qj.3042
journal April 2017
Aerosol properties and their impacts on surface CCN at the ARM Southern Great Plains site during the 2011 Midlatitude Continental Convective Clouds Experiment journal January 2018
Satellite Observations of Precipitating Marine Stratocumulus Show Greater Cloud Fraction for Decoupled Clouds in Comparison to Coupled Clouds journal May 2018
The Relationships Between Cloud Top Radiative Cooling Rates, Surface Latent Heat Fluxes, and Cloud-Base Heights in Marine Stratocumulus journal October 2018
Comparison of Daytime Low-Level Cloud Properties Derived From GOES and ARM SGP Measurements journal August 2018
Post Cold Frontal Clouds at the ARM Eastern North Atlantic Site: An Examination of the Relationship Between Large‐Scale Environment and Low‐Level Cloud Properties journal November 2018
Mechanisms Behind the Extratropical Stratiform Low‐Cloud Optical Depth Response to Temperature in ARM Site Observations journal February 2019
The Interaction Between Boundary Layer and Convection Schemes in a WRF Simulation of Post Cold Frontal Clouds Over the ARM East North Atlantic Site journal April 2019
Midlatitude Oceanic Cloud and Precipitation Properties as Sampled by the ARM Eastern North Atlantic Observatory journal April 2019
Drizzle and Turbulence Below Closed Cellular Marine Stratocumulus Clouds journal June 2019
The Correlation of Mesoscale Humidity Anomalies With Mesoscale Organization of Marine Stratocumulus From Observations Over the ARM Eastern North Atlantic Site journal December 2019
A global view on the effect of water uptake on aerosol particle light scattering journal August 2019
Substantial Seasonal Contribution of Observed Biogenic Sulfate Particles to Cloud Condensation Nuclei journal February 2018
Evaluation of autoconversion and accretion enhancement factors in general circulation model warm-rain parameterizations using ground-based measurements over the Azores collection January 2018
Evaluation of autoconversion and accretion enhancement factors in general circulation model warm-rain parameterizations using ground-based measurements over the Azores journal January 2018
Marine boundary layer aerosol in the eastern North Atlantic: seasonal variations and key controlling processes journal January 2018
Characterization of shallow oceanic precipitation using profiling and scanning radar observations at the Eastern North Atlantic ARM observatory journal January 2019
Characterization of Shallow Oceanic Precipitation using Profiling and Scanning Radar Observations at the Eastern North Atlantic ARM Observatory journal April 2019
Joint retrievals of cloud and drizzle in marine boundary layer clouds using ground-based radar, lidar and zenith radiances journal January 2015
The Ocean Carbon States Database: a proof-of-concept application of cluster analysis in the ocean carbon cycle journal January 2018
The Cloud Feedback Model Intercomparison Project (CFMIP) contribution to CMIP6 journal January 2017

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Clouds, Aerosols, and Precipitation in the Marine Boundary Layer: An Arm Mobile Facility Deployment
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