2002 Annual

Wednesday, 16 January 2002
Are improvements to upper air observing systems needed?
F. J. Schmidlin, NASA/GSFC, Wallops Island, VA
Technological improvements to upper atmosphere sounding systems will result in better measurements of temperature, relative humidity, wind, and ozone. Improvement of radiosonde ground systems and computers, the use of differential Global Position System DGPS, new temperature and relative humidity sensors, and studies designed to understand upper air measurement techniques better contribute to a better understanding of upper atmosphere dynamics and chemistry. Temperature and relative humidity measurements can have spurious errors if the actual measurement location is not related to their actual geographic positions. The magnitude of these differences is discussed. The need to incorporate new sensor technology in the present observing systems is needed now.

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