Richard Rotunno

Bio: Richard Rotunno is an academic researcher from National Center for Atmospheric Research. The author has contributed to research in topics: Mesoscale meteorology & Vortex. The author has an hindex of 60, co-authored 177 publications receiving 12680 citations. Previous affiliations of Richard Rotunno include University Corporation for Atmospheric Research & Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences.

A Theory for Strong, Long-Lived Squall Lines

Abstract: We study herein the mechanics of long-lived, line-oriented, precipitating cumulus convection (squall lines) using two- and three-dimensional numerical models of moist convection. These models, used in juxtaposition, enable us to address the important theoretical issue of whether a squall line is a system of special, long-lived cells, or whether it is a long-lived system of ordinary, short-lived cells. Our review of the observational literature indicates that the latter is the most consistent paradigm for the vast majority of cases but, on occasion, a squall line may be composed of essentially steady, supercell thunderstorms. The numerical experiments presented herein show that either type of squall line may develop from an initial line-like disturbance depending on the magnitude and orientation of the environmental shear with respect to the line. With shallow shear, oriented perpendicular to the line, a long-lived line evolves containing individually short-lived cells. Our analysis of this type o...

An Air–Sea Interaction Theory for Tropical Cyclones. Part II: Evolutionary Study Using a Nonhydrostatic Axisymmetric Numerical Model

Abstract: In Part I of this study an analytical model for a steady-state tropical cyclone is constructed on the assumption that boundary-layer air parcels are conditionally neutral to displacements along the angular momentum surfaces of the hurricane vortex. The reversible thermodynamics implied by this assumption allows the mature storm to be thought of as a simple Carnot engine, acquiring heat at the high-temperature ocean surface and losing heat near the low-temperature tropopause. Although the oceanic heat source is universally recognized as the sine qua non for the mature hurricane, there is also wide acceptance of conditional instability of the second kind (CISK) (which makes no specific reference to surface heat fluxes) as the formative mechanism. This ambivalence is seen in that all numerical-simulation studies find it essential to have transfer from the ocean surface yet all start from a conditionally unstable atmosphere. The hypothesis put forward in Part I, based on the steady-state theory, is t...

Prediction of Landfalling Hurricanes with the Advanced Hurricane WRF Model

Abstract: Real-time forecasts of five landfalling Atlantic hurricanes during 2005 using the Advanced Research Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) (ARW) Model at grid spacings of 12 and 4 km revealed performance generally competitive with, and occasionally superior to, other operational forecasts for storm position and intensity. Recurring errors include 1) excessive intensification prior to landfall, 2) insufficient momentum exchange with the surface, and 3) inability to capture rapid intensification when observed. To address these errors several augmentations of the basic community model have been designed and tested as part of what is termed the Advanced Hurricane WRF (AHW) model. Based on sensitivity simulations of Katrina, the inner-core structure, particularly the size of the eye, was found to be sensitive to model resolution and surface momentum exchange. The forecast of rapid intensification and the structure of convective bands in Katrina were not significantly improved until the grid spacing ap...

On the Rotation and Propagation of Simulated Supercell Thunderstorms

Abstract: We examine the rotation and propagation of the supercell-like convection produced by our three-dimensional cloud model. The rotation in the supercell is studied in terms of the conservation of equivalent potential vorticity and V. Bjerknes' first circulation theorem; neither of these have been used previously in this connection, and we find that they significantly contribute to the current level of understanding in this area. Using these we amplify the findings of our previous work in which we found that the source of midlevel rotation is the horizontally oriented vorticity associated with the environmental shear, while the low-level rotation derives from the baroclinic generation of horizontally oriented vorticity along the low-level cold-air boundary. We further demonstrate that these same processes that amplify the low-level rotation also produce the distinctive cloud feature known as the “wall cloud.” We find that the thunderstorm propagates rightward primarily because of the favorable dynami...

The Influence of the Shear-Induced Pressure Gradient on Thunderstorm Motion

Abstract: In the present investigation we propose a simple theory to explain how a veering environmental wind shear vector can cause an initially symmetric updraft to grow preferentially to the right of the shear vector and acquire cyclonic rotation. The explanation offered is based on linear theory which predicts that interaction of the mean shear with the updraft produces favorable vertical pressure gradients along its right flank. To asses the validity of linear theory for large-amplitude updrafts, the three-dimensional, shallow, anelastic equations are numerically integrated using a simple parameterization for latent heating within a cloud and the linear and nonlinear forcing terms are separately analyzed. These results suggest that although the nonlinear effects strongly promote splitting of the updraft, the linear forcing remains the dominant factor in preferentially enhancing updraft growth on the right flank. We believe this differential forcing is a major contributor to the observed predominance o...

Numerical study of convection observed during the Winter Monsoon Experiment using a mesoscale two-dimensional model [presentation]

Abstract: Abstract A two-dimensional version of the Pennsylvania State University mesoscale model has been applied to Winter Monsoon Experiment data in order to simulate the diurnally occurring convection observed over the South China Sea. The domain includes a representation of part of Borneo as well as the sea so that the model can simulate the initiation of convection. Also included in the model are parameterizations of mesoscale ice phase and moisture processes and longwave and shortwave radiation with a diurnal cycle. This allows use of the model to test the relative importance of various heating mechanisms to the stratiform cloud deck, which typically occupies several hundred kilometers of the domain. Frank and Cohen's cumulus parameterization scheme is employed to represent vital unresolved vertical transports in the convective area. The major conclusions are: Ice phase processes are important in determining the level of maximum large-scale heating and vertical motion because there is a strong anvil componen...

Linear and nonlinear waves, by G. B. Whitham. Pp.636. £50. 1999. ISBN 0 471 35942 4 (Wiley).

Abstract: to be done in this area. Face recognition is a problem that scarcely clamoured for attention before the computer age but, having surfaced, has involved a wide range of techniques and has attracted the attention of some fine minds (David Mumford was a Fields Medallist in 1974). This singular application of mathematical modelling to a messy applied problem of obvious utility and importance but with no unique solution is a pretty one to share with students: perhaps, returning to the source of our opening quotation, we may invert Duncan's earlier observation, 'There is an art to find the mind's construction in the face!'.

The Changing Character of Precipitation

Abstract: From a societal, weather, and climate perspective, precipitation intensity, duration, frequency, and phase are as much of concern as total amounts, as these factors determine the disposition of precipitation once it hits the ground and how much runs off. At the extremes of precipitation incidence are the events that give rise to floods and droughts, whose changes in occurrence and severity have an enormous impact on the environment and society. Hence, advancing understanding and the ability to model and predict the character of precipitation is vital but requires new approaches to examining data and models. Various mechanisms, storms and so forth, exist to bring about precipitation. Because the rate of precipitation, conditional on when it falls, greatly exceeds the rate of replenishment of moisture by surface evaporation, most precipitation comes from moisture already in the atmosphere at the time the storm begins, and transport of moisture by the storm-scale circulation into the storm is vital....

Stratosphere‐troposphere exchange

Abstract: In the past, studies of stratosphere-troposphere exchange of mass and chemical species have mainly emphasized the synoptic- and small-scale mechanisms of exchange This review, however, includes also the global-scale aspects of exchange, such as the transport across an isentropic surface (potential temperature about 380 K) that in the tropics lies just above the tropopause, near the 100-hPa pressure level Such a surface divides the stratosphere into an “overworld” and an extratropical “lowermost stratosphere” that for transport purposes need to be sharply distinguished This approach places stratosphere-troposphere exchange in the framework of the general circulation and helps to clarify the roles of the different mechanisms involved and the interplay between large and small scales The role of waves and eddies in the extratropical overworld is emphasized There, wave-induced forces drive a kind of global-scale extratropical “fluid-dynamical suction pump,” which withdraws air upward and poleward from the tropical lower stratosphere and pushes it poleward and downward into the extratropical troposphere The resulting global-scale circulation drives the stratosphere away from radiative equilibrium conditions Wave-induced forces may be considered to exert a nonlocal control, mainly downward in the extratropics but reaching laterally into the tropics, over the transport of mass across lower stratospheric isentropic surfaces This mass transport is for many purposes a useful measure of global-scale stratosphere-troposphere exchange, especially on seasonal or longer timescales Because the strongest wave-induced forces occur in the northern hemisphere winter season, the exchange rate is also a maximum at that season The global exchange rate is not determined by details of near-tropopause phenomena such as penetrative cumulus convection or small-scale mixing associated with upper level fronts and cyclones These smaller-scale processes must be considered, however, in order to understand the finer details of exchange Moist convection appears to play an important role in the tropics in accounting for the extreme dehydration of air entering the stratosphere Stratospheric air finds its way back into the troposphere through a vast variety of irreversible eddy exchange phenomena, including tropopause folding and the formation of so-called tropical upper tropospheric troughs and consequent irreversible exchange General circulation models are able to simulate the mean global-scale mass exchange and its seasonal cycle but are not able to properly resolve the tropical dehydration process Two-dimensional (height-latitude) models commonly used for assessment of human impact on the ozone layer include representation of stratosphere-troposphere exchange that is adequate to allow reasonable simulation of photochemical processes occurring in the overworld However, for assessing changes in the lowermost stratosphere, the strong longitudinal asymmetries in stratosphere-troposphere exchange render current two-dimensional models inadequate Either current transport parameterizations must be improved, or else, more likely, such changes can be adequately assessed only by three-dimensional models

Climatologies at high resolution for the earth’s land surface areas

Abstract: High-resolution information on climatic conditions is essential to many applications in environmental and ecological sciences. Here we present the CHELSA (Climatologies at high resolution for the earth’s land surface areas) data of downscaled model output temperature and precipitation estimates of the ERA-Interim climatic reanalysis to a high resolution of 30 arc sec. The temperature algorithm is based on statistical downscaling of atmospheric temperatures. The precipitation algorithm incorporates orographic predictors including wind fields, valley exposition, and boundary layer height, with a subsequent bias correction. The resulting data consist of a monthly temperature and precipitation climatology for the years 1979–2013. We compare the data derived from the CHELSA algorithm with other standard gridded products and station data from the Global Historical Climate Network. We compare the performance of the new climatologies in species distribution modelling and show that we can increase the accuracy of species range predictions. We further show that CHELSA climatological data has a similar accuracy as other products for temperature, but that its predictions of precipitation patterns are better. Machine-accessible metadata file describing the reported data (ISA-Tab format)