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Information - AS1.10 Dynamics and chemistry of atmospheric moist convection
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Event Information |
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The goal of this session is to organize a joint forum for the wide
range of communities concerned with atmospheric convection and its
various aspects: both dynamics and chemistry, especially emphasizing
the importance of cloud physics and radiation. It is intended to bring
together observers, modelers, forecasters, and theoreticians. Moist
convection is the most important weather phenomenon in the tropical
atmosphere and the crucial component in large-scale processes such as
monsoons, Madden-Julian Oscillation, ENSO. Its contribution to surface
rainfall in the mid-latitudes during summer is significant.
Forecasting intense precipitation events strongly hinges on our
understanding of moist convection. Atmospheric convection is also a
key process which control the tropospheric composition above 5 km
through vertical transport and wet deposition. The improvement of wet
deposition and scavenging parameterizations is a key issue for
large-scale models. Contributions on that topic is encouraged. A wide
range of contributions will be accepted not only from those directly
dealing with moist convection, but also from those studying mesoscale
processes where convection plays a significant role, as well as
tropical and mid-latitude cyclones, tropical meteorology, and climate
dynamics.
This year's session will place particular emphases on the theoretical
aspects of convection studies and especially, but not exclusively,
welcome the contributions from these perspectives. By doing so, we are
hoping to stimulate new approaches to overcome long-standing technical
problems in modeling and parameterizing convection.
At a conceptual and observational level, issues have been raised about
the validity of quasi-equilibrium, especially over shorter time
scales. Very few cumulus parameterizations in general circulation
models use it without substantial modification and introduction of
numerous tuning parameters for optimizing model performance. However,
physically justifiable alternatives have been slow to emerge.
The needs for more explicit probability distribution functions related
to convective dynamics and microphysics, as well as for representing
stochastic aspects of convection, are widely recognized, but ways to
do so are not clear in general. Especially, the distribution of
convective vertical velocity remains one of the major open questions
in statistical convective dynamics.
For many reasons, including increasing spatial and temporal resolution
in "large-scale" models, a move to prognostic approaches in convective
parameterizations appears likely and desirable. A standard
approximation based on small fractional area occupied by convection is
no longer valid in this limit and removing this restriction will
require progress on understanding both mass fluxes and and vertical
velocities in convective systems.
Not limited to these examples, we welcome the contributions on fundamental
theoretical issues on atmospheric convection.
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Preliminary List of Solicited Speakers |
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 Back to Session Programme
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