Large-scale circulation drivers and stable water isotope characteristics of shallow clouds over the tropical North Atlantic ...

• Main Author: Villiger, Leonie
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Published: ETH Zurich 2022
• Subjects: stable water isotopes; numerical weather prediction models; CLOUDS METEOROLOGY; Hydrological cycle; METEOROLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS; infoeu-repo/classification/ddc/500; Natural sciences; FOS Natural sciences; North Atlantic
• Online Access: https://dx.doi.org/10.3929/ethz-b-000586270; http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11850/586270

Shallow trade-wind cumulus clouds have been a research focus in the recent decade due to their uncertain response to climate change. While in some models the occurrence of these clouds is strongly reduced under future climate conditions, it remains nearly invariant in others. These contradictory results reflect our limited understanding of the mechanisms involved in the formation and spatial organisation of these clouds. Processes on different scales are at play: turbulent fluxes, convective mixing, large-scale subsidence, and the clouds themselves, which affect the thermodynamical conditions in their surroundings through diabatic processes (i.e., cloud radiative effects, warming through condensation, evaporative cooling). To shed light on the complex cloud-circulation coupling, the field campaign Elucidate the Couplings Between Clouds, Convection and Circulation (in short EUREC4A) was carried out in 2020 in the vicinity of the Caribbean island Barbados. The intensive observation period took place from 20 ...