Abstract.A recent field campaign was conducted to measure the properties of thin, warm convective clouds forming under conditions of weak updrafts. During the campaign, shortlived clouds (on the order of minutes) with droplets' effective radius of 1-2 µm and low liquid water path (∼ 500 mg m −2 ) were measured. These low values are puzzling, since in most studies an effective radius of 4 µm is reported to serve as the lower bound for clouds. A theoretical cloud model designed to resolve the droplet-activation process suggested conditions that favor the formation of such clouds. Here we show that these clouds, which mark the transition from haze to cloud, are highly sensitive to the magnitude of the initial perturbation that initiated them. We define these clouds as "transition-zone clouds". The existence of such clouds poses a key challenge for the analysis of atmospheric observations and models, since they "further smooth" the transition from dry aerosol through haze pockets to cumulus clouds.
The emergence of IR hyperspectral sensors in recent years enables their use in remote environmental monitoring of gaseous plumes. IR hyperspectral imaging combines the unique advantages of traditional remote sensing methods such as multispectral imagery and nonimaging Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, while eliminating their drawbacks. The most significant improvement introduced by hyperspectral technology is the capability of standoff detection and discrimination of effluent gaseous plumes without need for a clear reference background or any other temporal information. We introduce a novel approach for detection and discrimination of gaseous plumes in IR hyperspectral imagery using a divisive hierarchical clustering algorithm. The utility of the suggested detection algorithm is demonstrated on IR hyperspectral images of the release of two atmospheric tracers. The application of the proposed detection method on the experimental data has yielded a correct identification of all the releases without any false alarms. These encouraging results show that the presented approach can be used as a basis for a complete identification algorithm for gaseous pollutants in IR hyperspectral imagery without the need for a clear background.
Abstract. Clouds play a critical role in the Earth's radiative budget as they modulate the atmosphere by reflecting shortwave solar radiation and absorbing long wave IR radiation emitted by the Earth's surface. Although extensively studied for decades, cloud modelling in global circulation models is far from adequate, mostly due to insufficient spatial resolution of the circulation models. In addition, measurements of cloud properties still need improvement, since the vast majority of remote sensing techniques are focused in relatively large, thick clouds. In this study, we utilize ground based hyperspectral measurements and analysis to explore very thin water clouds. These clouds are characterized by liquid water path (LWP) that spans from as high as ∼50g m −2 and down to 65 mg m −2 with a minimum of about 0.01 visible optical depth. The retrieval methodology relies on three elements: a detailed radiative transfer calculations in the longwave IR regime, signal enhancement by subtraction of a clear sky reference, and spectral matching method which exploits fine spectral differences between water droplets of different radii. A detailed description of the theoretical basis for the retrieval technique is provided along with a comprehensive discussion regarding its limitations. The proposed methodology was validated in a controlled experiment where artificial clouds were sprayed and their effective radii were both measured and retrieved simultaneously. This methodology can be used in several ways: (1) the frequency and optical properties of very thin water clouds can be studied more precisely in order to evaluate their total radiative forcing on the Earth's radiation budget. (2) The unique optical properties of the inter-region between clouds (clouds' "twilight zone") can be studied in order to more rigorously understanding of the governing physical processes which dominate this region.(3) Since the optical thickness of a developed cloud gradually decreases towards its edges, the proposed methodology can be used to study the spatial microphysical behaviour of these edges. (4) A spatial-temporal analysis can be used to study mixing processes in clouds' entrainment zone.
A ground-based field campaign was conducted during the summer of 2011, 10 km east of the Israeli coast, aimed at studying small, warm convective clouds. During the campaign, clouds were detected on days that were predicted to be cloud-free by standard forecasting methods. Moreover, the clouds' bases were often much lower than the estimated lifting condensation level. Detailed air parcel model simulations revealed that such small non-buoyant clouds can form only if the convective motion is driven by perturbations in the relative humidity in the middle of the boundary layer, rather than by temperature perturbations near the surface. Furthermore, cloud base height exhibited weak sensitivity to the initial elevation of the parcel, suggesting that it serves as an accumulation point for many relative-humidity-perturbed thermodynamic trajectories. Such a mechanism is likely to be common under atmospheric conditions of a hot and humid boundary layer capped by a strong inversion layer.
A ground-based field campaign was conducted over the summer of 2011 in Israel to measure the properties of small warm clouds. The horizontal size distribution for cloud sizes of 50-3000 m is presented, with a special focus on the properties of the smallest clouds (liquid water path <10 g m −2 , cloud thickness < ∼50 m) and their estimated radiative effect. We show that these small clouds dominate the cloud radiative properties during the summer over the studied region. The average daily cloud cover of the small cloud subset throughout the field campaign was 81 ± 21% (corresponding to 30 ± 14.3% of the total measured time), and they contributed 83 ± 19.4% of the clouds' reflectance. Their average daily radiative effect was estimated at −3.6 ± 2.1 W m −2 .
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