Mesoscale Convective Systems in Nature and in Models

The historical advances in our understanding of MCSs has been well documented by Houze (2018) as a part of AMS’s “Century of Progress” monograph.

Arguably, two main threads of MCS research have been conducted largely in parallel over the past 40-50 years. One main thread has involved climatologies, field projects, and observational case studies of MCSs, from both the mid-latitudes and the tropics. The other main thread has involved numerical modeling studies of MCSs, often carried out under highly idealized conditions. The rather weak connections between these two approaches have at times produced contradictory conclusions or counter-intuitive advice for operational meteorologists.

Stronger connections have begun to emerge as more kinds of MCSs have been sampled and as modern numerical modeling studies have grown in breadth and complexity (to include more realistic wind and thermal profiles as well as more sophisticated representations of precipitation, radiation, and surface physics). The proposed talk will focus specifically on ways to identify and move forward from the common ground between the observational and modeling MCS research communities.