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Title: Cloud Phase and Relative Humidity Distributions over the Southern Ocean in Austral Summer Based on In Situ Observations and CAM5 Simulations

Journal Article · · Journal of Climate
 [1]; ORCiD logo [1];  [2];  [3];  [4];  [4]
  1. San Jose State Univ. San Jose, CA (United States)
  2. Univ. of Wyoming, Laramie, WY (United States); Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), Beijing (China)
  3. Univ. of Wyoming, Laramie, WY (United States)
  4. National Center for Atmospheric Research, Boulder, CO (United States)
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Cloud phase and relative humidity (RH) distributions at -67° to 0°C over the Southern Ocean during austral summer are compared between in situ airborne observations and global climate simulations. A scale-aware comparison is conducted using horizontally averaged observations from 0.1 to 50 km. Cloud phase frequencies, RH distributions, and liquid mass fraction are found to be less affected by horizontal resolutions than liquid and ice water content (LWC and IWC, respectively), liquid and ice number concentrations (Ncliq and Ncice, respectively), and ice supersaturation (ISS) frequency. At -10° to 0°C, observations show 27%–34% and 17%–37% of liquid and mixed phases, while simulations show 60%–70% and 3%–4%, respectively. Simulations overestimate (underestimate) LWC and Ncliq in liquid (mixed) phase, overestimate Ncice in mixed phase, underestimate IWC in ice and mixed phases, and underestimate (overestimate) liquid mass fraction below (above) -5°C, indicating that observational constraints are needed for different cloud phases. RH frequently occurs at liquid saturation in liquid and mixed phases for all datasets, yet the observed RH in ice phase can deviate from liquid saturation by up to 20%–40% at -20° to 0°C, indicating that the model assumption of liquid saturation for coexisting ice and liquid is inaccurate for low liquid mass fractions (<0.1). Simulations lack RH variability for partial cloud fractions (0.1–0.9) and underestimate (overestimate) ISS frequency for cloud fraction <0.1 (≥0.6), implying that improving RH subgrid-scale parameterizations may be a viable path to account for small-scale processes that affect RH and cloud phase heterogeneities. Lastly, two sets of simulations (nudged and free-running) show very similar results (except for ISS frequency) regardless of sample sizes, corroborating the statistical robustness of the model–observation comparisons.

Research Organization:
Univ. of Wyoming, Laramie, WY (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE Office of Science (SC); National Science Foundation (NSF)
Grant/Contract Number:
SC0014239; AGS-1642291; 2017YFA0603503; AGS-1642289
OSTI ID:
1612123
Journal Information:
Journal of Climate, Vol. 32, Issue 10; ISSN 0894-8755
Publisher:
American Meteorological SocietyCopyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Citation Metrics:
Cited by: 22 works
Citation information provided by
Web of Science

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Impacts of Representing Heterogeneous Distribution of Cloud Liquid and Ice on Phase Partitioning of Arctic Mixed‐Phase Clouds with NCAR CAM5 journal December 2019

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Related Subjects

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES
meteorology &amp; atmospheric sciences
cloud microphysics
cloud water/phase
humidity
aircraft observations
climate models
cloud parameterizations