Heating profiles in tropical deep convection with associated stratiform precipitation: a major Houze contribution

Field campaigns make a meteorologist really look at the sky and think. And then there are data.

Expeditions to the tropics show broad stratiform precipitation regions, and the deductions in Houze 1982 in JMSJ laid down the marker on undestanding the implications. From an inferred "impact" to a central mechanism in coupled phenomena, top-heavy heating profiles remain one of Bob Houze's most influential legacies, as we will review in this presentation.