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Regional dependence of microphysical and radiative effects of ice clouds on vertical structures of tropical tropospheric temperature

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Abstract

Regional dependence of microphysical and radiative effects of ice clouds on vertical structure of tropical tropospheric temperature is examined by analyzing thermodynamic budgets over clear sky, raining stratiform, convective, and non-raining stratiform regions with three two-dimensional sensitivity equilibrium cloud-resolving model simulation data. The decrease in the mean tropospheric cooling caused by radiative effects of ice clouds results from the decreases in local atmospheric cooling over clear sky regions around 12–16 km through the decrease in heat divergence and below 7.5 km through the decrease in radiative cooling and over non-raining stratiform regions around 6–13 km through the increase in latent heat. The increase in the mean tropospheric cooling caused by microphysical effects of ice clouds results from the increases in local atmospheric cooling over clear sky regions through the decrease in heat convergence below 4 km the increase in radiative cooling around 4–8 km and over non-raining stratiform regions through the increase in radiative cooling around 7–10 km. The raining regions do not show any significant thermal changes due to the cancellation between heat convergence and latent heat.

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Acknowledgments

The authors thank Dr. W.-K. Tao at NASA/GSFC for his cloud-resolving model. This work is supported by the Knowledge Innovation Program of the Chinese Academy of Sciences under the Grant No. KZCX2-YW-Q11-04 and the National Natural Sciences Foundation of China under the Grants No. 40775038, 40975036 and 40875031 and the Environment Science and Technology Research Center Foundation of Wuxi.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Laboratory of Cloud-Precipitation Physics and Severe Storms (LACS), Institute of Atmospheric Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 100029, Beijing, China

    Fan Ping

  2. Wuxi Research Center for Environment Science and Technology, 214031, Wuxi, China

    Fan Ping & Zhexian Luo

  3. Remote Sensing College, Nanjing University of Information Science and Technology, 210044, Nanjing, China

    Zhexian Luo

  4. NOAA/NESDIS/Center for Satellite Applications and Research, Camp Springs, Maryland, USA

    Xiaofan Li

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  1. Fan Ping
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  2. Zhexian Luo
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Correspondence to Fan Ping.

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Responsible editor: L. Gimeno.

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Ping, F., Luo, Z. & Li, X. Regional dependence of microphysical and radiative effects of ice clouds on vertical structures of tropical tropospheric temperature. Meteorol Atmos Phys 112, 29–39 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00703-011-0129-9

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00703-011-0129-9

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