Speaker
Description
The four-wavelengths differential absorption lidar (DIAL) WALES has been operated onboard the research aircraft HALO over the past 15 years to measure water vapor (WV) profiles from the Arctic to the Tropics. Here, we present a study on the quantification of the lower-stratospheric moist bias in the ERA5 reanalysis using the multi-campaign WALES dataset. The applied 33000 mid-latitude profiles from six campaigns (41 flights) allow the strong vertical gradients at the tropopause and the vertical structure of the moist bias to be better characterized and quantified. The transport of WV across the tropopause, which is shaping WV in the upper-troposphere and lower-stratosphere (UTLS), and the relation of lower tropospheric humidity to oceanic surface fluxes and large-scale dynamics are upcoming science topics of the North Atlantic Waveguide, DI, and Downstream Impact Campaign (NAWDIC) in 2026. We illustrate plans to combine WALES with a wind lidar during NAWDIC to derive vertical and horizontal WV fluxes.
Although the deployment of an airborne DIAL is limited to individual campaigns and only allows sporadic events and particular processes to be studied, applications in atmospheric dynamics, cloud research and model verification demonstrate the merit and potential of the DIAL technique. Through technological innovations in the past decades and the recent success with operating lidars from space (EarthCARE, Aeolus), we believe it is the right time to promote the implementation of a space-borne DIAL for the future generation of range-resolved WV climate data records (CDRs) in the stratosphere and troposphere. We present a suggestion for such a space-borne DIAL for the monitoring of global WV, which is based on the experience with the airborne DIAL WALES and highlight related challenges and opportunities for climate applications and to improve numerical weather prediction.
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