Midwinter Arctic leads form and dissipate low clouds
<jats:title>Abstract</jats:title><jats:p>Leads are a key feature of the Arctic ice pack during the winter owing to their substantial contribution to the surface energy balance. According to the present understanding, enhanced heat and moisture fluxes from high lead concentrations t...
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Online Access: | http://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1958431 https://www.osti.gov/biblio/1958431 https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-019-14074-5 |
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ftosti:oai:osti.gov:1958431 2023-07-30T04:01:19+02:00 Midwinter Arctic leads form and dissipate low clouds Li, Xia Krueger, Steven K. Strong, Courtenay Mace, Gerald G. Benson, Sally 2023-07-10 application/pdf http://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1958431 https://www.osti.gov/biblio/1958431 https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-019-14074-5 unknown http://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1958431 https://www.osti.gov/biblio/1958431 https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-019-14074-5 doi:10.1038/s41467-019-14074-5 54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES 2023 ftosti https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-019-14074-5 2023-07-11T10:24:54Z <jats:title>Abstract</jats:title><jats:p>Leads are a key feature of the Arctic ice pack during the winter owing to their substantial contribution to the surface energy balance. According to the present understanding, enhanced heat and moisture fluxes from high lead concentrations tend to produce more boundary layer clouds. However, described here in our composite analyses of diverse surface- and satellite-based observations, we find that abundant boundary layer clouds are associated with low lead flux periods, while fewer boundary layer clouds are observed for high lead flux periods. Motivated by these counterintuitive results, we conducted three-dimensional cloud-resolving simulations to investigate the underlying physics. We find that newly frozen leads with large sensible heat flux but low latent heat flux tend to dissipate low clouds. This finding indicates that the observed high lead fractions likely consist of mostly newly frozen leads that reduce any pre-existing low-level cloudiness, which in turn decreases downwelling infrared flux and accelerates the freezing of sea ice.</jats:p> Other/Unknown Material Arctic ice pack Sea ice SciTec Connect (Office of Scientific and Technical Information - OSTI, U.S. Department of Energy) Arctic Midwinter ENVELOPE(139.931,139.931,-66.690,-66.690) Nature Communications 11 1 |
institution |
Open Polar |
collection |
SciTec Connect (Office of Scientific and Technical Information - OSTI, U.S. Department of Energy) |
op_collection_id |
ftosti |
language |
unknown |
topic |
54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES |
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54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES Li, Xia Krueger, Steven K. Strong, Courtenay Mace, Gerald G. Benson, Sally Midwinter Arctic leads form and dissipate low clouds |
topic_facet |
54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES |
description |
<jats:title>Abstract</jats:title><jats:p>Leads are a key feature of the Arctic ice pack during the winter owing to their substantial contribution to the surface energy balance. According to the present understanding, enhanced heat and moisture fluxes from high lead concentrations tend to produce more boundary layer clouds. However, described here in our composite analyses of diverse surface- and satellite-based observations, we find that abundant boundary layer clouds are associated with low lead flux periods, while fewer boundary layer clouds are observed for high lead flux periods. Motivated by these counterintuitive results, we conducted three-dimensional cloud-resolving simulations to investigate the underlying physics. We find that newly frozen leads with large sensible heat flux but low latent heat flux tend to dissipate low clouds. This finding indicates that the observed high lead fractions likely consist of mostly newly frozen leads that reduce any pre-existing low-level cloudiness, which in turn decreases downwelling infrared flux and accelerates the freezing of sea ice.</jats:p> |
author |
Li, Xia Krueger, Steven K. Strong, Courtenay Mace, Gerald G. Benson, Sally |
author_facet |
Li, Xia Krueger, Steven K. Strong, Courtenay Mace, Gerald G. Benson, Sally |
author_sort |
Li, Xia |
title |
Midwinter Arctic leads form and dissipate low clouds |
title_short |
Midwinter Arctic leads form and dissipate low clouds |
title_full |
Midwinter Arctic leads form and dissipate low clouds |
title_fullStr |
Midwinter Arctic leads form and dissipate low clouds |
title_full_unstemmed |
Midwinter Arctic leads form and dissipate low clouds |
title_sort |
midwinter arctic leads form and dissipate low clouds |
publishDate |
2023 |
url |
http://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1958431 https://www.osti.gov/biblio/1958431 https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-019-14074-5 |
long_lat |
ENVELOPE(139.931,139.931,-66.690,-66.690) |
geographic |
Arctic Midwinter |
geographic_facet |
Arctic Midwinter |
genre |
Arctic ice pack Sea ice |
genre_facet |
Arctic ice pack Sea ice |
op_relation |
http://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1958431 https://www.osti.gov/biblio/1958431 https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-019-14074-5 doi:10.1038/s41467-019-14074-5 |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-019-14074-5 |
container_title |
Nature Communications |
container_volume |
11 |
container_issue |
1 |
_version_ |
1772812061497098240 |