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Characteristics of Water Vapor Turbulence Profiles In Convective Boundary Layers During The Dry and Wet Seasons Over Darwin

Abstract

This study explores water vapor turbulence in the convective boundary layer (CBL) using the Raman lidar observations from the Atmospheric Radiation Measurement site located at Darwin, Australia. An autocovariance technique was used to separate out the random instrument error from the atmospheric variability during time periods when the CBL is cloud-free, quasi-stationary, and well mixed. We identified 45 cases, comprising of 8 wet and 37 dry seasons events, over the 5-year data record period. The dry season in Darwin is known by warm and dry sunny days, while the wet season is characterized by high humidity and monsoonal rains. The inherent variability of the latter resulted in a more limited number of cases during the wet season. Profiles of the integral scale, variance, coefficient of the structure function, and skewness were analyzed and compared with similar observations from the Raman lidar at the Atmospheric Radiation Measurement Southern Great Plains (SGP) site. The wet season shows larger median variance profiles than the dry season, while the median profile of the variance from the dry season and the SGP site are found to be more comparable particularly between 0.4 and 0.75 zi. The variance and coefficient of the structure function show qualitatively the same vertical pattern. Furthermore, deeper CBL, larger gradient of water vapor mixing ratio at zi, and the strong correlation with the water vapor variance at zi are seen during the dry season. The median value in the skewness is mostly positive below 0.6 zi unlike the SGP site.

Article / Publication Data
Active/Online
YES
Volume
123
Available Metadata
Accepted On
April 23, 2018
DOI ↗
Early Online Release
April 23, 2018
Fiscal Year
NOAA IR URL ↗
Peer Reviewed
YES
Publication Name
Journal of Geophysical Research - Atmospheres
Published On
June 01, 2018
Publisher Name
American Geophysical Union
Print Volume
123
Print Number
10
Page Range
4818-4836
Issue
10
Submitted On
November 14, 2017
URL ↗

Authors

Authors who have authored or contributed to this publication.