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At least 325 records · Page 18

Impacts of spatial heterogeneity of anthropogenic aerosol emissions in a regionally refined global aerosol–climate model

Abstract. Emissions of anthropogenic aerosol and their precursors are often prescribed in global aerosol models. Most of these emissions are spatially heterogeneous at model grid scales. When remapped from low-resolution data, the spatial heterogeneity in emissions can be lost, leading to large errors in the simulation. It can also cause the conservation problem if non-conservative remapping is used. The default anthropogenic emission treatment in the Energy Exascale Earth System Model (E3SM) is subject to both problems. In this study, we introduce a revised emission treatment for the E3SM Atmosphere Model (EAM) that ensures conservation of mass fluxes and preserves the original emission heterogeneity at the model-resolved grid scale. We assess the error estimates associated with the default emission treatment and the impact of improved heterogeneity and mass conservation in both globally uniform standard-resolution (∼ 165 km) and regionally refined high-resolution (∼ 42 km) simulations. The default treatment incurs significant errors near the surface, particularly over sharp emission gradient zones. Much larger errors are observed in high-resolution simulations. It substantially underestimates the aerosol burden, surface concentration, and aerosol sources over highly polluted regions, while it overestimates these quantities over less-polluted adjacent areas. Large errors can persist at higher elevation for daily mean estimates, which can affect aerosol extinction profiles and aerosol optical depth (AOD). We find that the revised treatment significantly improves the accuracy of the aerosol emissions from surface and elevated sources near sharp spatial gradient regions, with significant improvement in the spatial heterogeneity and variability of simulated surface concentration in high-resolution simulations. In the next-generation E3SM running at convection-permitting scales where the resolved spatial heterogeneity is significantly increased, the revised emission treatment is expected to better represent the aerosol emissions as well as their lifecycle and impacts on climate.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗

The DOE E3SM version 2.1: overview and assessment of the impacts of parameterized ocean submesoscales

The U.S. Department of Energy's Energy Exascale Earth System Model (E3SM) version 2.1 builds on E3SMv2 with several changes, with the most notable being the addition of the Fox-Kemper et al. (2011) mixed-layer eddy parameterization. This parameterization captures the effect of finite-amplitude, mixed-layer eddies as an overturning streamfunction and has the primary function of restratification. Herein, we outline the changes to the mean climate state of E3SM that were introduced by the addition of this parameterization. Overall, the presence of the submesoscale parameterization improves the fidelity of the v2.1 simulation by reducing the ocean surface biases in the North Atlantic present in v2, as illustrated by changes in the climatological sea surface temperature and salinity and the Arctic sea-ice extent. Other impacts include a slight shoaling of the mixed-layer depths in the North Atlantic and a small improvement in the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC). We note that the expected shoaling due to the parameterization is regionally dependent in our coupled configuration. In addition, we investigate why the parameterization and its impacts on mixed-layer depth have little impact on the simulated AMOC: despite increased dense-water formation in the Norwegian Sea, only a small fraction of the water formed makes its way south into the North Atlantic basin. Version 2.1 also exhibits small improvements in the atmospheric climatology, with smaller biases in many notable quantities and modes of variability.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗

NeuralMie (v1.0): an aerosol optics emulator

The direct interactions of atmospheric aerosols with radiation significantly impact the Earth's climate and weather and are important to represent accurately in simulations of the atmosphere. This work introduces two contributions to enable a more accurate representation of aerosol optics in atmosphere models: (1) NeuralMie, a neural network Mie scattering emulator that can directly compute the bulk optical properties of a diverse range of aerosol populations and is appropriate for use in atmosphere simulations where aerosol optical properties are parameterized, and (2) TAMie, a fast Python-based Mie scattering code based on the Toon and Ackerman (1981) Mie scattering algorithm that can represent both homogeneous and coated particles. TAMie achieves speed and accuracy comparable to established Fortran Mie codes and is used to produce training data for NeuralMie. NeuralMie is highly flexible and can be used for a wide range of particle types, wavelengths, and mixing assumptions. It can represent core-shell scattering and, by directly estimating bulk optical properties, is more efficient than existing Mie code and Mie code emulators while incurring negligible error compared to existing aerosol optics parameterization schemes (0.08 % mean absolute percentage error).

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗

Validation of turbulence intensity as simulated by the Weather Research and Forecasting model off the US northeast coast

We report turbulence intensity (TI) is often used to quantify the strength of turbulence in wind energy applications and serves as the basis of standards in wind turbine design. Thus, accurately characterizing the spatiotemporal variability in TI should lead to improved predictions of power production. Nevertheless, turbulence measurements over the ocean are far less prevalent than over land due to challenges in instrumental deployment, maintenance, and operation. Atmospheric models such as mesoscale (weather prediction) and large-eddy simulation (LES) models are commonly used in the wind energy industry to assess the spatial variability of a given site. However, the TI derivation from atmospheric models has not been well examined. An algorithm is proposed in this study to realize online calculation of TI in the Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) model. Simulated TI is divided into two components depending on scale, including sub-grid (parameterized based on turbulence kinetic energy (TKE)) and grid resolved. The sensitivity of sea surface temperature (SST) on simulated TI is also tested. An assessment is performed by using observations collected during a field campaign conducted from February to June 2020 near the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution Martha's Vineyard Coastal Observatory. Results show that while simulated TKE is generally smaller than the lidar-observed value, wind speed bias is usually small. Overall, this leads to a slight underestimation in sub-grid-scale estimated TI. Improved SST representation subsequently reduces model biases in atmospheric stability as well as wind speed and sub-grid TI near the hub height. Large TI events in conjunction with mesoscale weather systems observed during the studied period pose a challenge to accurately estimating TI from models. Due to notable uncertainty in accurately simulating those events, this suggests summing up sub-grid and resolved TI may not be an ideal solution. Efforts in further improving skills in simulating mesoscale flow and cloud systems are necessary as the next steps.

17 WIND ENERGY↗

A user-oriented synthetic workload generator

A user oriented synthetic workload generator that simulates users' file access behavior based on real workload characterization is described. The model for this workload generator is user oriented and job specific, represents file I/O operations at the system call level, allows general distributions for the usage measures, and assumes independence in the file I/O operation stream. The workload generator consists of three parts which handle specification of distributions, creation of an initial file system, and selection and execution of file I/O operations. Experiments on SUN NFS are shown to demonstrate the usage of the workload generator.

Kao, Wei-Lun↗

Nucleation and chiral symmetry breaking under controlled hydrodynamic flows

The effects of hydrodynamic convection on nucleation and broken chiral symmetry have been investigated for a simple inorganic molecule, sodium chlorate (NaClO3). Our experiment suggests that the symmetry breaking is a result of hydrodynamic amplification of rare nucleation events. The effect is more pronounced when the primary nucleation occurs on the solute-vapor interface, where mixing in the surface sublayer becomes important. The transition from the achiral to the chiral states appears to be smooth as the hydrodynamic parameters, such as flow rate, are varied.

Wu, Xiao-Lun↗

Electromagnetic waves with frequencies near the local proton gyrofrequency: ISEE-3 1 AU observations

Low Frequency (LF) electromagnetic waves with periods near the local proton gyrofrequency have been detected in interplanetary space by the magnetometer onboard International-Sun-Earth-Explorer-3 (ISEE-3). Transverse peak-to-peak amplitudes as large as delta vector B/absolute value of B approximately 0.4 have been noted with compressional components (Delta absolute value of B/absolute value of B) typically less than or = 0.1. Generally, the waves have even smaller amplitudes, or are not detectable within the solar wind turbulence. The waves are elliptically/linearly polarized and are often, but not always, found to propagate nearly along vector B(sub zero). Both right- and left-hand polarizations in the spacecraft-frame have been detected. The waves are observed during all orientations of the interplanetary magnetic field, with the Parker spiral orientation being the most common case. Because the waves are detected at and near the local proton cyclotron frequency, the generation mechanism must almost certainly be solar wind pickup of freshly created hydrogen ions. Possible sources for the hydrogen are the Earth's atmosphere, coronal mass ejections from the Sun, comets and interstellar neutral atoms. At this time it is not obvious which potential source is the correct one. Statistical tests employing over one year of ISEE-3 data will be done in the near future to eliminate/confirm some of these possibilities.

Tsurutani, Bruce T.↗

Electric Field Induced Interfacial Instabilities

The study of the interface in a charge-free, nonpolar, critical and near-critical binary fluid in the presence of an externally applied electric field is presented. At sufficiently large fields, the interface between the two phases of the binary fluid should become unstable and exhibit an undulation with a predefined wavelength on the order of the capillary length. As the critical point is approached, this wavelength is reduced, potentially approaching length-scales such as the correlation length or critical nucleation radius. At this point the critical properties of the system may be affected. In zero gravity, the interface is unstable at all long wavelengths in the presence of a field applied across it. It is conjectured that this will cause the binary fluid to break up into domains small enough to be outside the instability condition. The resulting pattern formation, and the effects on the critical properties as the domains approach the correlation length are of acute interest. With direct observation, laser light scattering, and interferometry, the phenomena can be probed to gain further understanding of interfacial instabilities and the pattern formation which results, and dimensional crossover in critical systems as the critical fluctuations in a particular direction are suppressed by external forces.

Kusner, Robert E.↗

Chiral Symmetry Breaking in Crystal Growth: Is Hydrodynamic Convection Relevant?

The effects of mechanical stirring on nucleation and chiral symmetry breaking have been investigated for a simple inorganic molecule, sodium chlorate (NaClO3). In contrast to earlier findings, our experiment suggests that the symmetry breaking may have little to do with hydrodynamic convection. Rather the effect can be reasonably accounted for by mechanical damage to incipient crystals. The catastrophic events, creating numerous small 'secondary' crystals, produce statistical domination of one chiral species over the other. Our conclusion is supported by a number of observations using different mixing mechanisms.

Martin, B.↗

Modeling the low-altitude trapped radiation environment

The predictions of models of trapped energetic particle radiation at low altitudes, including the NASA trapped radiation models, are compared with low altitude measurements of energetic protons and electrons. Knowledge of the trapped energetic particle radiation at low altitudes in the vicinity of the south Atlantic magnetic anomaly is considered to be important for the analysis of the space environmental effects on space systems in this region. The long term trends in the observations are generally consistent with the NASA trapped radiation models. The discrepancies between the models and observations are currently being investigated using a 3D diffusive model and realistic atmospheric and magnetic field models. The requirements for future work and development of low altitude trapped radiation environment models are discussed.

Fung, Shing F.↗

Electric Field Induced Interfacial Instabilities

The study of the interface in a charge-free, critical and near-critical binary fluid in the presence of an externally applied electric field is presented. At sufficiently large fields, the interface between the two phases of the binary fluid should become unstable and exhibit an undulation with a predefined wavelength on the order of the capillary length. As the critical point is approached, this wavelength is reduced, potentially approaching length-scales such as the correlation length or critical nucleation radius. At this point the critical properties of the system may be affected. In this paper, the flat interface of a marginally polar binary fluid mixture is stressed by a perpendicular alternating electric field and the resulting instability is characterized by the critical electric field E(sub c) and the pattern observed. The character of the surface dynamics at the onset of instability is found to be strongly dependent on the frequency f of the field applied. The plot of E(sub c) vs. f for a fixed temperature shows a sigmoidal shape, whose low and high frequency limits are well described by a power-law relationship, E(sub c) = epsilon(exp zeta) with zeta = 0.35 and zeta = 0.08, respectively. The low-limit exponent compares well with the value zeta = 4 for a system of conducting and non-conducting fluids. On the other hand, the high-limit exponent coincides with what was first predicted by Onuki. The instability manifests itself as the conducting phase penetrates the non-conducting phase. As the frequency increases, the shape of the pattern changes from an array of bifurcating strings to an array of column-like (or rod-like) protrusions, each of which spans the space between the plane interface and one of the electrodes. For an extremely high frequency, the disturbance quickly grows into a parabolic cone pointing toward the upper plate. As a result, the interface itself changes its shape from that of a plane to that of a high sloping pyramid.

Kusner, Robert E.↗

Lagrangian Assimilation of Satellite Data for Climate Studies in the Arctic

Under this grant we have developed and tested a new Lagrangian model of sea ice. A Lagrangian model keeps track of material parcels as they drift in the model domain. Besides providing a natural framework for the assimilation of Lagrangian data, it has other advantages: 1) a model that follows material elements is well suited for a medium such as sea ice in which an element retains its identity for a long period of time; 2) model cells can be added or dropped as needed, allowing the spatial resolution to be increased in areas of high variability or dense observations; 3) ice from particular regions, such as the marginal seas, can be marked and traced for a long time; and 4) slip lines in the ice motion are accommodated more naturally because there is no internal grid. Our work makes use of these strengths of the Lagrangian formulation.

Lindsay, Ronald W.↗

Fast Rotating Scalar and Multi-component Bose Gases

We show that in the limit of large angular momentum, many equilibrium and dynamical phenomena of scalar and multi-component Bose gases can be accounted for by approximating the system to reside in an effective lowest Landau level. This method explains the origin of the mysterious stripe formation in fast rotating Bose gas recently observed at JILA, and accounts for all the dynamical details observed in this experiment. To further demonstrate the usefulness of this method, we present its predictions of the interference patterns of two vortex lattices, and rich vortex lattice structures in multi-component Bose gases.

Ho, TIn-Lun Jason↗

Long-Term Variations of the Electron Slot Region and Global Radiation Belt Structure

We report the observations of changes of the nominal position of the quiet-time radiation belt slot over the solar cycles. It has been found that the slot region, believed to be a result of enhanced precipitation losses of energetic electrons due to their interactions with VLF waves in the magnetosphere, tends to shift to higher L (approximately 3) during a solar maximum compared to its canonical L value of approximately 2.5, which is more typical of a solar minimum. The solar-cycle migration of the slot can be understood in terms of the solar-cycle changes in ionospheric densities, which may cause the optimal wave-particle interaction region during higher solar activity periods to move to higher altitudes and higher latitudes, thus higher L. Our analysis also suggests that the primary wave-particle interaction processes that result in the slot formation are located off of the magnetic equator.

Fung, Shing F.↗