Year of tropical convection (YOTC): status and research agenda

The realistic representation of tropical convection in our global atmospheric models is a long-standing grand challenge for numerical weather forecasts and global climate predictions. Our lack of fundamental knowledge and practical capabilities in this area leaves us disadvantaged in modeling and predicting prominent phenomena of the tropical atmosphere such as the ITCZ, ENSO, monsoons and their active/break periods, the MJO, subtropical stratus decks, near-surface ocean properties, tropical cyclones, and even the diurnal cycle. To address this the challenge of tropical convection, WCRP and WWRP/THORPEX are conducting a joint research activity consisting coordinated observing, modeling and forecasting of organized tropical convection. The timing, focus year approach and integrated framework of this effort is intended to exploit the vast amounts of existing observations, the expanding computational resources and the development of new, high-resolution modeling frameworks, with the objective of advancing the characterization, diagnosis, modeling, parameterization and prediction of multi-scale convective/dynamic interactions, including the two-way interaction between tropical and extra-tropical weather/climate. The target time frame for scientific focus is May 2008 to April 2010, and was chosen as a period that would leverage the most benefit from recent investments in Earth Science infrastructure and overlapping programmatic activities (e.g., AMY, T-PARC). Specific areas of emphasis identified in YOTC are: 1) MJO and convectively coupled waves, 2) diurnal cycle, 3) easterly waves and tropical cyclones, 4) tropical-extratropical interactions, and 5) monsoon. This presentation will describe the current status of YOTC's science and implementation plans, available resources and research agenda.