The Use and Analysis of Profiler Winds to Derive Mesoscale Height and Temperature Fields: Simulation and Real-Data Experiments

Cram, Jennifer M.; Kaplan, Michael L.; Mattocks, Craig; Zack, John W.

doi:10.1175/1520-0493(1991)119<1040:tuaaop>2.0.co;2

Cited by 8 publications

(10 citation statements)

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“…The mass retrieval approach developed by Cram et al (1991) and Karyampudi et al (1995) was modified in the following ways. The data domain was expanded to include 3-hourly rawinsonde and NOAA profiler sites within the STORM-FEST domain.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…RASS is limited to lower-tropospheric levels [Ͻ3.5 km above ground level (AGL)], and satellite retrievals are method/ first guess dependent (Stankov 1998). Alternatively, the mesoscale mass and thermal structure for a region of the atmosphere can be retrieved through knowledge of the wind field, such as from a network of wind profilers, and application of the divergence equation (Fankhauser 1974;Kuo and Anthes 1985;Kuo et al 1987a,b;Modica and Warner 1987;Gal-Chen 1988;Cram et al 1991;Karyampudi et al 1995).…”

Section: O N T H L Y W E a T H E R R E V I E Wmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The results were quite sensitive to applied boundary conditions, with the use of Dirichlet boundary conditions providing the least error in the retrieved fields. Cram et al (1991) were the first to attempt to apply the divergence method to actual, as opposed to simulated, wind profiler observations. Their use of a small network of four profilers located in northeast Colorado produced a retrieved height field that was able to resolve a mesoscale trough that had gone undetected by the standard synoptic network.…”

Section: O N T H L Y W E a T H E R R E V I E Wmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…However, direct verification of the accuracy of the generated fields was not possible with just four profilers; thus, model output and other data sources were used to infer the accuracy of the results. Karyampudi et al (1995) extended the work of Cram et al (1991) in computing various kinematic diagnostics to identify a variety of mesoscale features. The fields were generated using the same approach employed by Cram et al (1991) except the vertical motion fields were derived kinematically using an O'Brien (1970) adjustment technique to minimize the accumulation of errors, which assumes that the error variance is a linear function of height.…”

Section: O N T H L Y W E a T H E R R E V I E Wmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Karyampudi et al (1995) extended the work of Cram et al (1991) in computing various kinematic diagnostics to identify a variety of mesoscale features. The fields were generated using the same approach employed by Cram et al (1991) except the vertical motion fields were derived kinematically using an O'Brien (1970) adjustment technique to minimize the accumulation of errors, which assumes that the error variance is a linear function of height. The derived fields were then verified against the linear vector point function method of Zamora et al (1987).…”

Section: O N T H L Y W E a T H E R R E V I E Wmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Extraction of Geopotential Height and Temperature Structure from Profiler and Rawinsonde Winds

2001

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Mesoscale height and temperature fields can be extracted from the observed wind field by making use of the full divergence equation. Mass changes associated with irrotational ageostrophic motions are retained for a nearly complete description of the height field. Above the boundary layer, in the absence of friction, the divergence equation includes terms composed of the components of the wind and a Laplacian of the geopotential height field. Once the mass field is determined, the thermal structure is obtained through application of the hypsometric equation.In this paper an error analysis of this divergence method is undertaken to estimate the potential magnitude of errors associated with random errors in the wind data. Previous applications of the divergence method have been refined in the following ways. (i) The domain over which the method is applied is expanded to encompass the entire STORM-FEST domain. (ii) Wind data from 23 profiler and 38 rawinsonde sites are combined in the analysis. (iii) Observed profiler and rawinsonde data are interpolated to grid points through a modified objective analysis, and (iv) the variation in elevation of the profiler sites is taken into account.The results of the application of the divergence method to the combined wind data from profiler and rawinsonde sites show good agreement between the retrieved heights and temperatures and the observed values at rawinsonde sites. Standard deviations of the difference between the retrieved and observed data lie well within the precision of the rawinsonde instruments. The difference field shows features whose magnitude is significantly larger than the errors predicted by the error analysis, and these features are systematic rather than random in nature, suggesting that the retrieved fields are able to resolve mesoscale signatures not fully captured by the rawinsonde data alone.The divergence method is also applied solely to the profiler data to demonstrate the potential of the divergence method to provide mass and thermal fields on a routine basis at synoptic times when operational rawinsonde data are not available. A comparison of the heights derived from the profiler winds with those independently measured by rawinsondes indicates that valuable information on the evolution of atmospheric height and temperature fields can be retrieved between conventional rawinsonde release times through application of the divergence method. The implications of the results for applications of the method in weather analysis and in numerical weather prediction are discussed.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%