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Ravi Govindaraju

Publications and source records attributed to Ravi Govindaraju.

15 records
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
NASA NTRS2024

Benchmarking GOCART-2G in the Goddard Earth Observing System (GEOS)

The Goddard Chemistry Aerosol Radiation and Transport (GOCART) model, which controls the sources sinks and chemistry within the Goddard Earth Observing System, recently underwent a major refactoring and update to the representation of physical processes. This paper serves to document code changes that were included in GOCART 2nd Generation (GOCART-2G) and establishes a benchmark simulation that is to be used for future development of the system. The code refactoring increases flexibility such multiple instances of an aerosol species can be run and interact with radiation and cloud microphysics, in addition to the output of multiple wavelength aerosol optical properties in support of data assimilation. From a science perspective, a new radiatively active tracer, brown carbon, was added to distinguish smoke from other sources of organic aerosol thereby improving optical properties entering the radiative calculations. A four-year benchmark simulation was evaluated using in situ and space borne measurements to develop a baseline and prioritize future development. A comparison of simulated aerosol optical depth between GOCART-2G and MODIS retrievals indicates the model captures the overall spatial pattern and seasonal cycle of aerosol optical depth but overestimates aerosol extinction over dusty regions and underestimates aerosol extinction over northern hemisphere boreal forests, requiring further tuning of emissions. This MODIS-based analysis is corroborated by comparisons to MISR and selected AERONET stations. Despite the underestimate of aerosol optical depth in biomass burning regions in GEOS, there is an overestimate in the surface mass of organic carbon in the United States, especially during the summer months.

Allison B Collow↗
NASA NTRS2022

An Evaluation of Biomass Burning Aerosol Mass, Extinction, and Size Distribution in Geos Using Observations From Camp2EX

Biomass burning aerosol impacts aspects of the atmosphere and Earth system through radiative forcing, serving as cloud condensation nuclei, and air quality. Despite its importance, the representation of biomass burning aerosol is not always accurate in numerical weather prediction and climate models or reanalysis products. Using observations collected as part of the Cloud, Aerosol and Monsoon Processes Philippines Experiment (CAMP2Ex) in August through October of 2019, aerosol concentration and optical properties are evaluated within the Goddard Earth Observing System (GEOS) and its underlying aerosol module, GOCART. In the operational configuration, GEOS assimilates aerosol optical depth observations at 550 nm to constrain aerosol fields. Particularly for biomass burning aerosol, without the assimilation of aerosol optical depth, aerosol extinction is underestimated compared to observations collected in the Philippines region during the CAMP2Ex campaign. The assimilation process adds excessive amounts of carbon to account for the underestimated extinction, resulting in positive biases in the mass of black and organic carbon, especially within the boundary layer, relative to in situ observations from the Langley Aerosol Research Group Experiment. Counteracting this, GEOS is deficient in sulphate and nitrate aerosol just above the boundary layer. Aside from aerosol mass, extinction within GEOS is a function of ambient relative humidity and an assumed particle size distribution. The relationship between dry and ambient extinction in GEOS reveals that hygroscopic growth is too aggressive within the model for biomass burning aerosol. An additional concern lies in the assumed particle size distribution for GEOS, which has a mode radius that is too small for organic carbon. Variability in the observed particle size distribution for biomass burning aerosol within a single flight also illuminates the fact that a single assumed particle size distribution is not sufficient and that for a proper representation, a more advanced aerosol module with GEOS may be necessary.

Aerosol Mass↗
NASA NTRS2020

Modeling the smoky troposphere of the southeast Atlantic: a comparison to ORACLES airborne observations from September of 2016

In the southeast Atlantic, well-defined smoke plumes from Africa advect over marine boundary layer cloud decks; both are most extensive around September, when most of the smoke resides in the free troposphere. A framework is put forth for evaluating the performance of a range of global and regional atmospheric composition models against observations made during the NASA ORACLES (ObseRvations of Aerosols above CLouds and their intEractionS) airborne mission in September 2016. A strength of the comparison is a focus on the spatial distribution of a wider range of aerosol composition and optical properties than has been done previously. The sparse airborne observations are aggregated into approximately 2° grid boxes and into three vertical layers: 3–6 km, the layer from cloud top to 3 km, and the cloud-topped marine boundary layer. Simulated aerosol extensive properties suggest that the flight-day observations are reasonably representative of the regional monthly average, with systematic deviations of 30 % or less. Evaluation against observations indicates that all models have strengths and weaknesses, and there is no single model that is superior to all the others in all metrics evaluated. Whereas all six models typically place the top of the smoke layer within 0–500 m of the airborne lidar observations, the models tend to place the smoke layer bottom 300–1400 m lower than the observations. A spatial pattern emerges, in which most models underestimate the mean of most smoke quantities (black carbon, extinction, carbon monoxide) on the diagonal corridor between 16° S, 6° E, and 10° S, 0° E, in the 3–6 km layer, and overestimate them further south, closer to the coast, where less aerosol is present. Model representations of the above-cloud aerosol optical depth differ more widely. Most models overestimate the organic aerosol mass concentrations relative to those of black carbon, and with less skill, indicating model uncertainties in secondary organic aerosol processes. Regional-mean free-tropospheric model ambient single scattering albedos vary widely, between 0.83 and 0.93 compared with in situ dry measurements centered at 0.86, despite minimal impact of humidification on particulate scattering. The modeled ratios of the particulate extinction to the sum of the black carbon and organic aerosol mass concentrations (a mass extinction efficiency proxy) are typically too low and vary too little spatially, with significant inter-model differences. Most models overestimate the carbonaceous mass within the offshore boundary layer. Overall, the diversity in the model biases suggests that different model processes are responsible. The wide range of model optical properties requires further scrutiny because of their importance for radiative effect estimates.

Yohei Shinozuka↗
NASA NTRS2020

Apparent dust size discrepancy in aerosol reanalysis in north African dust after long-range transport

North African dust reaches the southeastern United States every summer. Size-resolved dust mass measurements taken in Miami, Florida, indicate that more than one-half of the surface dust mass concentrations reside in particles with geometric diameters less than 2.1 µm, while vertical profiles of micropulse lidar depolarization ratios show dust reaching above 4 km during pronounced events. These observations are compared to the representation of dust in the Modern-Era Retrospective analysis for Research and Applications, version 2 (MERRA-2) aerosol reanalysis and closely related Goddard Earth Observing System model version 5 (GEOS-5) Forward Processing (FP) aerosol product, both of which assimilate satellite-derived aerosol optical depths using a similar protocol and inputs. These capture the day-to-day variability in aerosol optical depth well, in a comparison to an independent sun-photometer-derived aerosol optical depth dataset. Most of the modeled dust mass resides in diameters between 2 and 6 µm, in contrast to the measurements. Model-specified mass extinction efficiencies equate light extinction with approximately 3 times as much aerosol mass, in this size range, compared to the measured dust sizes. GEOS-5 FP surface-layer sea salt mass concentrations greatly exceed observed values, despite realistic winds and relative humidities. In combination, these observations help explain why, despite realistic total aerosol optical depths, (1) free-tropospheric model volume extinction coefficients are lower than those retrieved from the micro-pulse lidar, suggesting too-low model dust loadings in the free troposphere, and (2) model dust mass concentrations near the surface can be higher than those measured. The modeled vertical distribution of dust, when captured, is reasonable. Large, aspherical particles exceeding the modeled dust sizes are also occasionally present, but dust particles with diameters exceeding 10 µm contribute little to the measured total dust mass concentrations after such long-range transport. Remaining uncertainties warrant a further integrated assessment to confirm this study's interpretations.

MEERA-2 aerosols reanalysis↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Evaluation of GEOS Aerosols Using CAMP2Ex Observations

Biomass burning aerosol impacts aspects of the atmosphere and Earth system through direct and semi-direct effects, as well as influencing air quality. Despite its importance, the representation of biomass burning aerosol is not always accurate in numerical weather prediction and climate models or reanalysis products. Using observations collected as part of the Cloud, Aerosol and Monsoon Processes Philippines Experiment (CAMP2Ex) in August through October of 2019, aerosol concentration and optical properties are evaluated within the Goddard Earth Observing System (GEOS) and its underlying aerosol module, GOCART. In the operational configuration, GEOS assimilates aerosol optical depth observations at 550 nm from AERONET and MODIS to constrain aerosol fields. Particularly for biomass burning aerosol, without the assimilation of aerosol optical depth, aerosol extinction is underestimated compared to observations collected in the Philippines region during the CAMP2Ex campaign. The assimilation process adds excessive amounts of carbon to account for the underestimated extinction, resulting in positive biases in the mass of black and organic carbon, especially within the boundary layer, relative to in situ observations from the Langley Aerosol Research Group Experiment. Counteracting this, GEOS is deficient in sulfate and nitrate aerosol just above the boundary layer. Aerosol extinction within GEOS is a function of the mass of different aerosol species, the ambient relative humidity, the assumed spectral optical properties, and particle size distribution per species. The relationship between dry and ambient extinction in GEOS reveals that hygroscopic growth is too high within the model for biomass burning aerosol. An additional concern lies in the assumed particle size distribution for GEOS, which has a single mode radius that is too small for organic carbon. Variability in the observed particle size distribution for biomass burning aerosol within a single flight also illuminates the fact that a single assumed particle size distribution is not sufficient and that for a proper representation, a more advanced aerosol module within GEOS may be necessary.

Allison Collow↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

The Representation of Aerosols in GMAO’s Newest Reanalyses

Over the past few years, NASA’s Global Modelling and Assimilation Office has been working on the configuration and production of three new reanalysis products, GEOS-IT, GiOcean, and MERRA-21C. GEOS-IT, or the Goddard Earth Observing System for Instrument Teams, is a 3D variational data assimilation system that runs in a near real time framework however retrospectively provides data back through 1998 to deliver a consistent view of the Earth-atmosphere system for the production of observational NASA products. Retrospective production for GEOS-IT is complete and the meteorology has since been used to produce the one way weakly coupled GiOcean reanalysis. Due to differences in the atmospheric model, particularly related to scavenging, aerosols are not identical in GEOS-IT and GiOcean. MERRA-21C, or the Modern Era Restrospective analysis for Research and Applications in the 21st century, is a hybrid 4D ensemble variational system at a finer horizontal resolution of 0.25 degrees. Although different in their intended use, and therefore configuration, these systems prominently feature coupling between meteorology and aerosols. The differences and similarities in the aerosol configuration between the three systems will be discussed, covering biomass burning and anthropogenic emissions as well as observations used for the assimilation of aerosol optical depth. A large emphasis will be placed on the version of the underlying aerosol module, GOCART, which underwent a complete refactoring and the addition of radiatively active brown carbon between GEOS-IT and MERRA-21C. Independent observations will be used to evaluate the performance of aerosols in both reanalyses, focusing on aerosol optical depth, surface particulate matter, and vertical profiles of aerosol backscatter.

Allison Collow↗