0000000000310355
AUTHOR
Th. Peter
Ultrathin Tropical Tropopause Clouds (UTTCs): II. Stabilization mechanisms
Abstract. Mechanisms by which subvisible cirrus clouds (SVCs) might contribute to dehydration close to the tropical tropopause are not well understood. Recently Ultrathin Tropical Tropopause Clouds (UTTCs) with optical depths around 10-4 have been detected in the western Indian ocean. These clouds cover thousands of square kilometers as 200-300 m thick distinct and homogeneous layer just below the tropical tropopause. In their condensed phase UTTCs contain only 1-5% of the total water, and essentially no nitric acid. A new cloud stabilization mechanism is required to explain this small fraction of the condensed water content in the clouds and their small vertical thickness. This work sugges…
Airborne measurements of the nitric acid partitioning in persistent contrails
This study reports the first systematic measurements of nitric acid (HNO3) uptake in contrail ice particles at typical aircraft cruise altitudes. During the CIRRUS-III campaign cirrus clouds and almost 40 persistent contrails were probed with in situ instruments over Germany and Northern Europe in November 2006. Besides reactive nitrogen, water vapor, cloud ice water content, ice particle size distributions, and condensation nuclei were measured during 6 flights. Contrails with ages up to 12 h were detected at altitudes 10–11.5 km and temperatures 211–220 K. These contrails had a larger ice phase fraction of total nitric acid (HNO3ice/HNO3tot = 6%) than the ambient cirrus layers (3%). On av…
NATO ARW on Clouds — Session Summaries
The two papers presented in this session focused on the role of dynamics in the water vapor distribution of the tropics and its implications to climate.
Ultrathin Tropical Tropopause Clouds (UTTCs) : I. Cloud morphology and occurrence
Abstract. Subvisible cirrus clouds (SVCs) may contribute to dehydration close to the tropical tropopause. The higher and colder SVCs and the larger their ice crystals, the more likely they represent the last efficient point of contact of the gas phase with the ice phase and, hence, the last dehydrating step, before the air enters the stratosphere. The first simultaneous in situ and remote sensing measurements of SVCs were taken during the APE-THESEO campaign in the western Indian ocean in February/March 1999. The observed clouds, termed Ultrathin Tropical Tropopause Clouds (UTTCs), belong to the geometrically and optically thinnest large-scale clouds in the Earth's atmosphere. Individual UT…
HNO3 partitioning in cirrus clouds
During the 1997 POLSTAR-1 winter campaign in northern Sweden a flight was performed across a cold trough of air (similar or equal to 196 K) in the tropopause region. Measurements of total water vapour, nitric acid, particles and reactive nitrogen (NOy) were taken. The particle measurements indicate that about 3% of the particles in the moist tropospheric air were ice particles. Forward and backward facing NOy inlets were used simultaneously to determine condensed phase HNO3. The combined NOy and particle measurements reveal that less than 1% of a monolayer of NOy could have resided on the ice particles. This casts doubt on the hypothesis that sedimenting cirrus particles generally lead to a…