Case Analysis of Turbulence From High-Resolution Sounding Data in Northwest China

Abstract

This study calculated the Thorpe scale, thickness of turbulent layer, turbulent kinetic energy dissipation rate, and turbulent diffusion coefficient based on the Thorpe method using a set of near-space high-resolution radiosonde data in northwest China, and a case study was conducted to analyze the large-scale turbulent layer in the middle stratosphere. The results showed that the most turbulent layers exist near from the middle and upper troposphere to the tropopause region, accounting for 44.0% of the total turbulence, and the largest Thorpe scale and thickness of turbulent layer also appear in this altitude range. In addition, affected by the large-scale turbulence near the tropopause, the calculated turbulent energy dissipation rate and diffusion coefficient also have maximum values at this altitude, which are 0.003 m2s−3 and 6.94 m2s−1, respectively. By analyzing the meteorological elements, it is found that there is an obvious correlation between precipitation and large-scale turbulence in the stratosphere. When the precipitation occurs, the corresponding two sets of radiosondes detected larger-scale turbulence layers in the middle stratosphere.

Observation based climatology Martian atmospheric waves perturbation Datasets

“…The importance of gravity waves (GWs), stationary planetary waves (SPWs), and tides for the atmospheres of Mars are now universally recognized [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8] . In some cases, these waves act together to modify the atmosphere 9 , e.g.…”

A case analysis of turbulence characteristics and ozone perturbations over eastern China

“…In this paper, C k = 0.3 is also used to calculate ε based on the previous studies. (Clayson and Kantha 2008;He et al, 2020a;Qin et al, 2022). Atmospheric ozone variations are controlled by dynamic, radiative and chemical processes.…”

Characteristic Analysis of Relationship Between Precipitation and Turbulence in the Troposphere and Lower Stratosphere Over Tropical Western Pacific

“…(2010, 2011) pointed out the uncertainty caused by the false inversion of potential temperature caused by instrument noise during the detection process and improved the Thorpe method. At present, the Thorpe method has been used to analyze a variety of sounding data and achieved good results (Bellenger et al., 2017; He, Zheng, & He, 2020; Qin et al., 2022; Sun et al., 2016).…”

“…Qin et al. (2022) conducted a case study on turbulence over China and found that large‐scale turbulence layers appeared in the middle and lower stratosphere during the precipitation, where the $${N}^{2}$$ and Richardson number ( Ri ) were significantly reduced. The purpose of this study is to statistically analyze the correlation between turbulence and precipitation in the tropics, which can better predict the occurrence and development of free atmospheric turbulence.…”

“…Wilson et al (2010Wilson et al ( , 2011 pointed out the uncertainty caused by the false inversion of potential temperature caused by instrument noise during the detection process and improved the Thorpe method. At present, the Thorpe method has been used to analyze a variety of sounding data and achieved good results (Bellenger et al, 2017;He, Zheng, & He, 2020;Qin et al, 2022;Sun et al, 2016). Wilson et al (2011) first linked turbulence to moisture and pointed out that saturated water vapor can reduce the stability of the free atmosphere by releasing latent heat (LE), which is conductive to the generation of turbulence (Wilson et al, 2011;Wilson et al, 2013).…”