Abstract
The weather research and forecasting (WRF) model is a new generation mesoscale numerical model with a fine grid resolution (2 km), making it ideal to simulate the macro- and micro-physical processes and latent heating within Typhoon Molave (2009). Simulations based on a single-moment, six-class microphysical scheme are shown to be reasonable, following verification of results for the typhoon track, wind intensity, precipitation pattern, as well as inner-core thermodynamic and dynamic structures. After calculating latent heating rate, it is concluded that the total latent heat is mainly derived from condensation below the zero degree isotherm, and from deposition above this isotherm. It is revealed that cloud microphysical processes related to graupel are the most important contributors to the total latent heat. Other important latent heat contributors in the simulated Typhoon Molave are condensation of cloud water, deposition of cloud ice, deposition of snow, initiation of cloud ice crystals, deposition of graupel, accretion of cloud water by graupel, evaporation of cloud water and rainwater, sublimation of snow, sublimation of graupel, melting of graupel, and sublimation of cloud ice. In essence, the simulated latent heat profile is similar to ones recorded by the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission, although specific values differ slightly.
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Acknowledgements
The authors thank the National Supercomputing Center in Guangzhou for providing the use of super-computers. We are grateful to the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) Mesoscale and Microscale Meteorology Division: http://www.mmm.ucar.edu/wrf/users, which is responsible for the WRF model. The National Centers for Environmental Prediction final (NCEP-FNL) global tropospheric analysis data for this paper are available at http://rda.ucar.edu/datasets/ds083.2.
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Foundation item: The National Key Basic Research Program of China under contract No. 2014CB953904; the Natural Science Foundation of Guangdong Province under contract No. 2015A030311026; the National Natural Science Foundation of China under contract Nos 41275145 and 41275060.
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Liu, Y., Lin, W., Li, J. et al. A numerical simulation of latent heating within Typhoon Molave. Acta Oceanol. Sin. 36, 39–47 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13131-017-1082-3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s13131-017-1082-3