PDFs of tropical tropospheric humidity: Measurements and theory

Journal of Climate

Volumn 22, Issue 12, 2009, Pages 3357-3373

  Ryoo, Ju Mee ^a   Igusa, Takeru ^b   Waugh, Darryn W ^a  

^a JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY   (United States)

^b Johns Hopkins University   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

ATMOSPHERIC INFRARED SOUNDERS; DATA SETS; DRYING TIME; HORIZONTAL TRANSPORT; MICROWAVE LIMB SOUNDER; MODEL FIT; MODEL PARAMETERS; PHYSICAL PROCESS; RELATIVE HUMIDITIES; SHERWOOD; SPATIAL VARIATIONS; STATISTICAL MODELS; TEMPORAL CHANGE; TROPOSPHERIC HUMIDITY; TWO PARAMETER;

ACOUSTIC DEVICES; ATMOSPHERIC HUMIDITY; ATMOSPHERICS; DEWATERING; INFRARED DEVICES; INFRARED INSTRUMENTS; MODELS; MOISTURE; PROBABILITY DENSITY FUNCTION; SOUNDING APPARATUS; SUBSIDENCE; TROPOSPHERE;

TROPICS;

ATMOSPHERIC CONVECTION; MICROWAVE LIMB SOUNDER; NUMERICAL MODEL; PROBABILITY DENSITY FUNCTION; RELATIVE HUMIDITY; TROPICAL ENVIRONMENT; TROPOSPHERE;

EID: 67651214083     PISSN: 08948755     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1175/2008JCLI2747.1     Document Type: Article

References (30)

1. Aumann, H. H., and Coauthors, 2003: AIRS/AMSU/HSB on the Aqua Mission: Design, science objectives and data products. IEEE Trans. Geosci. Remote Sens., 41, 253-264.
2. Dessler, A. E., and S. C. Sherwood, 2000: Simulations of tropical upper tropospheric humidity. J. Geophys. Res., 105, 20 155-20 163.
3. Dessler, A. E., and K. Minschwaner, 2007: An analysis of the regulation of tropical tropospheric water vapor. J. Geophys. Res., 112, D10120, doi:10.1029/2006JD007683.
4. Ekström, M., P. Eriksson, B. Rydberg, and D. P. Murtagh, 2007: First Odin sub-mm retrievals in the tropical upper troposphere: Humidity and cloud ice signals. Atmos. Chem. Phys., 7, 459-469.
5. Fetzer, E., and Coauthors, 2008: Comparison of upper tropospheric water vapor observations from the Microwave Limb Sounder and Atmospheric Infrared Sounder. J. Geophys. Res., 113, D22110, doi:10.1029/2008JD010000.
6. Folkins, I., K. K. Kelly, and E. M. Weinstock, 2002: A simple explanation for the increase in relative humidity between 11 and 14 km in the tropics. J. Geophys. Res., 107, 4736, doi:10.1029/ 2002JD002185.
7. Folkins, I., S. Fueglistaler, G. Lesins, and T. Mitovski, 2008: A low-level circulation in the tropics. J. Atmos. Sci., 65, 1019-1034.
8. Galewsky, J., A. Sobel, and I. Held, 2005: Diagnosis of subtropical humidity using tracers of last saturation. J. Atmos. Sci., 62, 3353-3367.
9. Gettelman, A., W. D. Collins, E. J. Fetzer, A. Eldering, F. W. Irion, P. B. Duffy, and G. Bala, 2006: Climatology of uppertropospheric relative humidity from the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder and implications for climate. J. Climate, 19, 6104-6121.
10. Gierens, K., U. Schumann, M. Helten, H. Smit, and A. Marence, 1999: A distribution law for relative humidity in the upper troposphere and lower stratosphere derived from three years of MOZAIC measurements. Ann. Geophys., 17, 1218-1226.
11. Hartmann, D. L., and K. Larson, 2002: An important constraint on tropical cloud-climate feedback. Geophys. Res. Lett., 29, 1951, doi:10.1029/2002GL015835.
12. Held, I. M., and B. J. Soden, 2000: Water vapor feedback and global warming. Annu. Rev. Energy Environ., 25, 441-475.
13. Künsch, H. R., 1989: The jackknife and the bootstrap for general stationary observations. Ann. Stat., 17, 1217-1241.
14. Livesey, N. J., L. J. Kovalenko, R. J. Salawitch, I. A. MacKenzie, M. P. Chipperfield, W. G. Read, R. F. Jarnot, and J. W. Waters, 2006: EOS Microwave Limb Sounder observations of upper stratospheric BrO: Implications for total bromine. Geophys. Res. Lett., 33, L20817, doi:10.1029/2006GL026930.
15. Luo, Z., D. Kley, R. H. Johnson, and H. Smit, 2007: Ten years of measurements of tropical upper-tropospheric water vapor by MOZAIC. Part I: Climatology, variability, transport, and relation to deep convection. J. Climate, 20, 418-435.
16. Pierrehumbert, R. T., 1998: Lateral mixing as a source of subtropical water vapor. Geophys. Res. Lett., 25, 1784-1806.
17. Pierrehumbert, R. T., and R. Roca, 1998: Evidence for control of Atlantic sub-tropical humidity by large scale advection. Geophys. Res. Lett., 25, 4537-4540.
18. Pierrehumbert, R. T., H. Brogniez, and R. Roca, 2006: On the relative humidity of the atmosphere. The Global Circulation of the Atmosphere, T. Schneider and A. H. Sobel, Eds., Princeton University Press.
19. Read, W. G., and Coauthors, 2001: UARS Microwave Limb Sounder upper tropospheric humidity measurement: Method and validation. J. Geophys. Res., 106, 32 207-32 258.
20. Read, W. G., and Coauthors, 2007: Aura Microwave Limb Sounder upper tropospheric and lower stratospheric H2O and relative humidity with respect to ice validation. J. Geophys. Res., 112, D24S35, doi:10.1029/2007JD008752.
21. Ryoo, J.-M., D. W. Waugh, and A. Gettelman, 2008: Variability of subtropical upper tropospheric humidity. Atmos. Chem. Phys., 8, 1041-1067.
22. Salathe, E. P., and D. L. Hartmann, 1997: A trajectory analysis of tropical upper-tropospheric moisture and convection. J. Climate, 10, 2533-2547.
23. Sherwood, S. C., 1996: Maintenance of the free-troposphere tropical water vapor distribution. Part II: Simulation by largescale advection. J. Climate, 9, 2919-2934.
24. Sherwood, S. C., E. R. Kursinski, and W. G. Read, 2006:Adistribution law for free-tropospheric relative humidity. J. Climate, 19, 6267-6277.
25. Soden, B. J., and F. P. Bretherton, 1993: Upper tropospheric relative humidity from the GOES 6.7 μm channel: Method and climatology for July 1987. J. Geophys. Res., 98 (D9), 16 669-16 688.
26. Spencer, R. W., and W. D. Braswell, 1997: How dry is the tropical free troposphere? Implications for global warming theory. Bull. Amer. Meteor. Soc., 78, 1097-1106.
27. Spichtinger, P., K. Gierens, and W. Read, 2002: The statistical distribution law of relative humidity in the global tropopause region. Meteor. Z., 11, 83-88.
28. Waugh, D. W., 2005: Impact of potential vorticity intrusions on subtropical upper tropospheric humidity. J. Geophys. Res., 110, D11305, doi:10.1029/2004JD005664.
29. Wilks, D. S., 1995: Statistical Methods in the Atmospheric Sciences. Academic Press, 467 pp.
30. Zhang, C., B. E. Mapes, and B. J. Soden, 2003: Bimodality in tropical water vapor. Quart. J. Roy. Meteor. Soc., 129, 2847-2866.