Determining Spatial Scales of Soil Moisture—Cloud Coupling Pathways Using Semi‐Idealized Simulations

Sakaguchi, Kôichi; Berg, Larry K.; Chen, J.; Fast, Jerome D.; Newsom, Rob; Tai, Sheng‐Lun; Yang, Zhao; Gustafson, William I.; Gaudet, Brian; Huang, Meng; Pekour, Mikhail; Pressel, Kyle G.; Xiao, Heng

doi:10.1029/2021jd035282

Cited by 6 publications

(6 citation statements)

References 104 publications

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“…In the LAFE experiment in the Southern Great Plains, US, Späth et al (2022) deployed a novel strategy for simultaneous measurements of atmospheric surface layer profiles of temperature, winds, and moisture to successfully infer regional-scale surface-atmosphere fluxes using scale-invariant theories such as Monin-Obhukov similarity relationships. Meanwhile, in the same region, during HI-SCALE, Sakaguchi et al (2022) demonstrate how scales of land cover heterogeneity differ from those of soil moisture heterogeneity in developing modes and mesoscale patterns in surface energy balance. Longer-term and distributed observations also allow for investigation of scale.…”

Section: A Scale For All Silosmentioning

confidence: 90%

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Scaling Land‐Atmosphere Interactions: Special or Fundamental?

et al. 2022

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Viewed from billions of kilometers away in space, Earth appears as a single "Pale Blue Dot," in the immortalized phrase of Carl Sagan bestowed upon the image taken by the Voyager 1 space probe. Coming closer, though, a sharper image emerges (Figure 1).One finds structure to that dot, shades of green and brown continents, a dark ocean, a bright cryosphere, and a hazy, thin blue atmosphere. Zooming further in, those components break into patterns of mountains and rivers, seas and bays, forests and grasslands, layers, and cloud decks. And getting closer, one finds each component has oscillations and variations of branches and rivulets, canyons and plateaus, currents and coastlines. These objects keep revealing more structure in finer, often self-similar form, like Mandelbrot's fractals, down to eddies and organisms, and further into leaves, cells, enzymes, molecules, and atoms.And then, if you wait seconds, days, decades, or eons, landscape patterns change. Bigger things typically take longer than smaller ones. As a result, the pattern changes-sometimes occurring slowly and subtly, ebbing and flowing in an oscillatory manner, or they can occur quickly and abruptly, morphing into a new state of order.Each element and its dynamics come with variations in space and time that can be encompassed by the concept of scale. Earth systems science is preoccupied with the interactions of these elements, which cannot be understood without a stipulation of the scales of interest (Ge et al., 2019). The most straightforward of these interactions are ones where common processes at all scales can be defined by a single relationship, often a power-law, leading to the concept of scale invariance (Paleri et al., 2022). The most interesting interactions are the ones that break those rules and lead to "upscale" and "downscale" behavior, whereby processes at one scale determine the shape and function of another scale. These are most common at the intersections of biology, hydrology, geology, and meteorology, often within what is termed the "critical zone." This interlocking also harkens to the origins of

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Section: A Scale For All Silosmentioning

confidence: 90%

“…Meanwhile, in the same region, during HI‐SCALE, Sakaguchi et al. (2022) demonstrate how scales of land cover heterogeneity differ from those of soil moisture heterogeneity in developing modes and mesoscale patterns in surface energy balance.…”

Section: A Scale For All Silosmentioning

confidence: 99%

Scaling Land‐Atmosphere Interactions: Special or Fundamental?

et al. 2022

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“…Soil moisture can also affect the turbulent heating over forest and grassland. Even though no large soil moisture difference are observed from site observations in the analysis domain, the soil moisture effect on cloud formation cannot be excluded (Chen et al., 2020; Findell & Eltahir, 2003; Pielke, 2001; Sakaguchi et al., 2022; Taylor et al., 2011, 2012). More advanced observations (e.g., soil moisture network, collocated boundary layer and cloud profiling) and high‐resolution numerical simulations with improved representations of clouds, atmospheric boundary layer, and land properties are needed to attribute the relative contributions of these intertwining processes (Beamesderfer et al., 2022).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

How Does Land Cover and Its Heterogeneity Length Scales Affect the Formation of Summertime Shallow Cumulus Clouds in Observations From the US Southern Great Plains?

Tian

Zhang

Klein

et al. 2022

Geophysical Research Letters

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This study investigates the effects of heterogeneous land covers on shallow cumulus (ShCu) clouds at the US Southern Great Plains using high‐resolution satellite and land cover data. During late summer, ShCu occurs over cities the most frequently and over open waters the least frequently, and more often over forest than over grassland. The preferential occurrence of ShCu over forest relative to grassland is consistent with surface measurements showing larger heat fluxes over forests. This preferential occurrence also varies with the length scales of land patches with the largest cloud occurrence difference shifting from smaller length scales (<9 km) during midday to larger scales (>9 km) in the early afternoon. Consistent with theory, these signals are more pronounced under low wind conditions. The preferential length scale shift with time suggests the existence of secondary circulations that strengthen and promote convergence over larger spatial scales as the differential land surface heating intensifies.

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“…Fast, Berg, Alexander, et al (2019) and Tao et al (2019) have elucidated the strength of land-atmosphere interactions and their important roles in modulating convective cloud formation and evolution. As the majority of these studies have focused on local convection or cumulus, the wide range of cloud types and their interactions with the land surface present a complex and multifaceted challenge (Poll et al, 2022;Sakaguchi et al, 2022;Tao et al, 2021). It is essential to delve into these characteristics and dissect the cloud-land relationships across different regimes to achieve a more detailed understanding of these interactions.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Observation and Reanalysis Derived Relationships Between Cloud and Land Surface Fluxes Across Cumulus and Stratiform Coupling Over the Southern Great Plains

Su,

Li,

Zhang

et al. 2024

Geophysical Research Letters

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Understanding interactions between low clouds and land surface fluxes is critical to comprehending Earth's energy balance, yet their relationships remain elusive, with discrepancies between observations and modeling. Leveraging long‐term field observations over the Southern Great Plains, this investigation revealed that cloud‐land interactions are closely connected to cloud‐land coupling regimes. Observational evidence supports a dual‐mode interaction: coupled stratiform clouds predominate in low sensible heat scenarios, while coupled cumulus clouds dominate in high sensible heat scenarios. Reanalysis data sets, MERRA‐2 and ERA‐5, obscure this dichotomy owing to a shortfall in representing boundary layer clouds, especially in capturing the initiation of coupled cumulus in high sensible heat scenarios. ERA‐5 demonstrates a relatively closer alignment with observational data, particularly in capturing relationships between cloud frequency and latent heat, markedly outperforming MERRA‐2. Our study underscores the necessity of distinguishing different cloud coupling regimes, essential to the understanding of their interactions for advancing land‐atmosphere interactions.

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Determining Spatial Scales of Soil Moisture—Cloud Coupling Pathways Using Semi‐Idealized Simulations

Cited by 6 publications

References 104 publications

Scaling Land‐Atmosphere Interactions: Special or Fundamental?

Scaling Land‐Atmosphere Interactions: Special or Fundamental?

How Does Land Cover and Its Heterogeneity Length Scales Affect the Formation of Summertime Shallow Cumulus Clouds in Observations From the US Southern Great Plains?

Observation and Reanalysis Derived Relationships Between Cloud and Land Surface Fluxes Across Cumulus and Stratiform Coupling Over the Southern Great Plains

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