With a variety of programming languages and data formats available, widespread adoption of computing standards by the atmospheric science community is often difficult to achieve. The Sounding and Hodograph Analysis and Research Program in Python (SHARPpy) is an open-source, cross-platform, upper-air sounding analysis and visualization package. SHARPpy is based on the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration/Storm Prediction Center’s (NOAA/SPC) in-house analysis package, SHARP, and is the result of a collaborative effort between forecasters at the SPC and students at the University of Oklahoma’s School of Meteorology. The major aim of SHARPpy is to provide a consistent framework for sounding analysis that is available to all. Nearly all routines are written to be as consistent as possible with the methods researched, tested, and developed in the SPC, which sets this package apart from other sounding analysis tools.SHARPpy was initially demonstrated and released to the atmospheric community a...

SHARPpy: An Open-Source Sounding Analysis Toolkit for the Atmospheric Sciences

The formation of ice particles in the atmosphere strongly affects cloud properties and the climate. While mineral dust is known to be an effective ice nucleating particle, the role of aerosols from anthropogenic pollution in ice nucleation is still under debate. Here we probe the ice nucleation ability of different aerosol types by combining 11-year observations from multiple satellites and cloud-resolving model simulations. We find that, for strong convective systems, the ice particle effective radius near cloud top decreases with increasing loading of polluted continental aerosols, because the ice formation is dominated by homogeneous freezing of cloud droplets, which are smaller under more polluted conditions. By contrast, an increase in ice particle effective radius with polluted continental aerosols is found for moderate convection. Our model simulations suggest that this positive correlation is explained by enhanced heterogeneous ice nucleation and prolonged ice particle growth at higher aerosol loading, indicating that polluted continental aerosols contain a considerable fraction of ice nucleating particles. Similar aerosol–ice relationships are observed for dust aerosols, further corroborating the ice nucleation ability of polluted continental aerosols. By catalysing ice formation, aerosols from anthropogenic pollution could have profound impacts on cloud lifetime and radiative effect as well as precipitation efficiency. Polluted continental aerosols contain a considerable fraction of ice nucleating particles, suggest analyses of satellite observations and simulations with cloud-resolving models.

Ice nucleation by aerosols from anthropogenic pollution.

[1] NOAA's next generation polar-orbiting environmental satellite system, designated as the Joint Polar Satellite System (JPSS), was proposed in February 2010, as part of the President's Fiscal Year 2011 budget request, to be the Civilian successor to the restructured National Polar-Orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System (NPOESS). Beginning 1 October 2013, the JPSS baseline consists of a suite of five instruments: advanced microwave and infrared sounders critical for short- and medium-range weather forecasting; an advanced visible and infrared imager needed for environmental assessments such as snow/ice cover, droughts, volcanic ash, forest fires and surface temperature; ozone sensor primarily used for global monitoring of ozone and input to weather and climate models; and an Earth radiation budget sensor for monitoring the Earth's energy budget. NASA will fund the Earth radiation budget sensor and the ozone limb sensor for the second JPSS operational satellite—JPSS-2. JPSS is implemented through a partnership between NOAA and the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). NOAA is responsible for overall funding; maintaining the high-level requirements; establishing international and interagency partnerships; developing the science and algorithms, and user engagement; NOAA also provides product data distribution and archiving of JPSS data. NASA's role is to serve as acquisition Center of Excellence, providing acquisition of instruments, spacecraft and the multimission ground system, and early mission implementation through turnover to NOAA for operations.

Joint Polar Satellite System: the United States New Generation Civilian Polar Orbiting Environmental Satellite System

Deep convective storms play a key role in severe weather, the hydrological cycle, and the global atmospheric circulation. Historically, little attention has been paid to the intense convective storms in the high latitudes. These regions have been experiencing the largest increases of mean surface temperature over the last century. The Global Precipitation Measurement core satellite, which features a space‐borne Dual‐frequency Precipitation Radar providing near‐global coverage (65°S to 65°N), has made it possible to establish the occurrence of convective storms at high latitudes. Analysis of the three‐dimensional radar echoes seen by Global Precipitation Measurement over a 5‐year period (2014–2018) shows that extremely intense deep convective storms do occur often during the warm season (April–September) in the high‐latitude continents where the increase of surface temperature has been greatest. The associated thermodynamical environments suggest that high‐latitude extreme convection could be more common in a continually warming world. Plain Language Summary Over the last century, the North Hemisphere high‐latitude continental regions (Siberia, northern Europe, and northern Canada) have experienced the greatest surface temperature increase on Earth. Launched in 2014, the Global Precipitation Measurement core observatory satellite with Dual‐frequency Precipitation Radar has been providing observations at these high latitudes. These observations show that extreme convective storms are occurring in these high‐latitude continental regions. Five years of these satellite radar data show statistics of these convective systems based on their three‐dimensional radar reflectivity structures. The patterns of occurrence are consistent with the statistics of reanalysis data on the surface wind, temperature, and humidity as well as thermodynamic profiles during the times of satellite‐observed storms.

Extreme Convective Storms Over High-Latitude Continental Areas Where Maximum Warming Is Occurring

In this paper, we describe how researchers and weather forecasters work together to make satellite sounding data sets more useful in severe weather forecasting applications through participation in National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)’s Hazardous Weather Testbed (HWT) and JPSS Proving Ground and Risk Reduction (PGRR) program. The HWT provides a forum for collaboration to improve products ahead of widespread operational deployment. We found that the utilization of the NOAA-Unique Combined Atmospheric Processing System (NUCAPS) soundings was improved when the product developer and forecaster directly communicated to overcome misunderstandings and to refine user requirements. Here we share our adaptive strategy for (1) assessing when and where NUCAPS soundings improved operational forecasts by using real, convective case studies and (2) working to increase NUCAPS utilization by improving existing products through direct, face-to-face interaction. Our goal is to discuss the lessons we learned and to share both our successes and challenges working with the weather forecasting community in designing, refining, and promoting novel products. We foresee that our experience in the NUCAPS product development life cycle may be relevant to other communities who can then build on these strategies to transition their products from research to operations (and operations back to research) within the satellite meteorological community.

Adapting Satellite Soundings for Operational Forecasting within the Hazardous Weather Testbed

Convective available potential energy (CAPE) is one of the physical quantities used by operational meteorologists when issuing severe-weather convective watches and warnings. Recent advances in satellite technology could provide timely observations of atmospheric temperature and water vapor profiles over the continental United States, but only limited validation exists in the literature to characterize uncertainties in CAPE derived from the new satellite sensors. In this study, 10 years of Vaisala, Inc., RS92 radiosonde observations from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) Southern Great Plains (SGP) site were matched to overpasses of the NASA Aqua satellite that were made from January 2005 through December 2014. Vertical profiles of temperature and water vapor from the NASA Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) were extracted in a region surrounding the DOE ARM SGP central facility near Lamont, Oklahoma. Surface-based CAPE was computed using software consiste...

Comparison of Satellite-, Model-, and Radiosonde-Derived Convective Available Potential Energy in the Southern Great Plains Region

Near-real-time satellite-derived temperature and moisture soundings provide information about the changing atmospheric vertical thermodynamic structure occurring between successive routine ...

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Jessica Gartzke

Papers

Comparison of Satellite-, Model-, and Radiosonde-Derived Convective Available Potential Energy in the Southern Great Plains Region

Near-Real-Time Surface-Based CAPE from Merged Hyperspectral IR Satellite Sounder and Surface Meteorological Station Data