Thursday, 6 June 2002
Large-scale organization of tropical convection in idealized numerical simulations: Impact of radiative processes
This presentation will discuss numerical results pertinent to the
problem of large-scale convection organization in the tropics. The
problem spans a wide range of spatial and temporal scales and involves
several physical processes, such as atmosphere-ocean interaction, moist
convection, cloud microphysics, radiative transfer, and equatorial wave
dynamics. Many theories have been proposed in the past to explain the
observed large-scale convection organization (e.g., wave-CISK, WISHE,
water vapor feedback, stochastic convective excitation, etc.). The
paper will look at the role of radiative processes in this problem.
First, 2D (x-z) cloud-resolving simulations will be presented in which
a periodic global-scale horizontal domain is used (20,000 km) and a
horizontally homogeneous SST is assumed. These idealized simulations
are relevant to understanding the interaction between tropical
convection and eastward-propagating Kelvin waves. Indeed, the
spontaneous organization of convection into eastward-propagating
super-cloud-clusters is observed in some of the 2D simulations. Second,
the interaction between equatorially-trapped disturbances and tropical
convection as simulated by a nonhydrostatic global model applying the
cloud-resolving convection parameterization (CRCP, the
super-parameterization) will be discussed. The CRCP represents subgrid
scales of the global model by imbedding a 2D cloud-resolving model in
each column of the global model. The modeling setup is a constant SST
aquaplanet (with the size and rotation as Earth) in
radiative-convective equilibrium. Spontaneous development of
eastward-propagating equatorially-trapped MJO-like disturbances is
observed in these simulations. The presentation will discuss results
from the two sets of simulations with the emphasis on the interaction
of radiation with water vapor and clouds.
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