Weekly Report for the Week of March 10, 2008
Print 
GSFC Laboratory for Atmospheres, Code 613
Mission related activities
David Starr (613.1) has accepted responsibility to develop a plan and implement a validation program for cloud and aerosol Environmental Data Records (EDR's) for the NPOESS Prepartory Mission (NPP). He attended a meeting of the NPP VIIRS Science Advisory Panel, a kick-off meeting of EDR cal/val leads, and met with key individuals representing operational agencies involved in cloud and aerosol EDR related activities for the Integrated Program Office (IPO) and NASA sponsored activities.
Discussion of ongoing field campaigns
The WAVES_2008 field campaign, being hosted at the Howard University Research Campus in Beltsville, MD, continues with the goals of radiosonde, ozonesonde and lidar validation measurements coordinated with A-train overpasses as well as characterization of Raman water vapor lidar measurements in the Upper Troposphere/Lower Stratosphere (UT/LS). The preliminary results indicate that Raman lidars are able to measure into the LS from the Beltsville location under conditions of low aerosol optical thickness during the nighttime. An interesting event was recorded on the night of Feb 27 (local) where, due to the very low tropopause height on that evening, 20 ppmv of water vapor was measured at a height of approximately 6 km above sea level. Such low values of water vapor are more indicative of stratospheric air than tropospheric. David Whiteman (613.1) is the NASA lead for WAVES_2008
Discussions of the results of concluded field campaign
Laboratory Scientists (613) played key leadership roles in the TC4 Science Workshop. Mark Schoeberl (610), Steve Platnick (613.2) and Peter Colarco (613.3) gave overview talks and led breakout groups on the topics of Aura Validation, Radiative Constraints on Ice Cloud Particle Size, and Saharan Dust/Aerosols, respectively. Co-Mission Scientist, Dave Starr (613.1), gave a summary of flight operations and data acquired during the mission. Other Laboratory scientists giving talks or posters were Gerry Heymsfield (613.1), Dennis Hlavka (613.1/SSAI), Randy Kawa (613.3), Kwo-Sen Kuo (613.1/UMBC), Matt McGill (613.1), Ken Pickering (613.3), Eric Smith (613.1), Lin Tian (613.1/UMBC), and Gala Wind (613.2/SSAI).
Meetings and seminars
The aerosol community at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC), Greenbelt MD, and the Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS), New York, held their 2008 Annual Aerosol Update on March 4, 2008 at GSFC. This annual event was started about 7 years ago at the initiative of the Director of the Earth Sciences Division, Dr. Franco Einaudi. At this year’s update, synthesis presentations presented by GSFC and GISS scientists highlighted a wide range of scientific activity in aerosol research, including ground-based, airborne, and satellite measurements and networks, aerosol retrieval and modeling, as well as analysis of aerosol impacts on air quality, clouds, precipitation, general circulation, and climate. The presentations were well received by the audience, which included researchers from agencies and universities around the Washington DC metropolitan area. Among the special guests were Program Managers from NASA Headquarters. To view presentations from the meeting, please visit: http://aerocenter.gsfc.nasa.gov/research/.
On March 7 Tom Bell (613.2) gave an invited seminar at the Univ. Md. (College
Park) Dept. of Atmospheric and Oceanic Science Atmospheric Chemistry Brown Bag Talks entitled "Midweek increase in U.S. summer rain and storm heights suggests air pollution invigorates rainstorms". For more information see http://www.atmos.umd.edu/~allen/brownbag.html.
Eyal Amitai (613.1, GMU) is convening the "General Session on Precipitation (H18)" at the AGU Joint Assembly in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, 27-30 May 2008. Abstract deadline is March 5.
Eyal Amitai (613.1, GMU) participated at the 3rd Int'l GPM Ground Validation Workshop in Buzios, Brazil (March 4-6, 2008), and presented the Israeli contribution to the mission.
Eyal Amitai (613.1, GMU) submitted the abstract "Comparing space and ground-based radar estimates of rain rates: Should we merge the two?" to the session on "Multi-Sensor Precipitation Estimation" at the AGU Joint Assembly in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, 27-30 May 2008.
Scott Braun (613.1) attended the 62nd Interdepartmental Hurricane Conference in Charleston, SC, on March 3-6, 2008. He was a Panel Member for a discussion on Interagency Priorities for Tropical Cyclone Research, giving the NASA perspective for Ramesh Kakar. He gave an oral presentation entitled "The Hurricane and Severe Storm Sentinel (HS3)" about the potential use of the Global Hawk unmanned airborne system for hurricane studies and gave a poster presentation entitled "The Saharan Air Layer and Improved Understanding of Atlantic Hurricane Formation and Intensification: Hope or Hype?". Gerry Heymsfield (613.1) also presented a poster entitle "Status of the NASA High Altitude Imaging Wind and Rain Profiler".
Publications
Platnick, S. (613.2) , and J. M. Fontenla, Model calculations of solar spectral irradiance in the 3.7 µm band for Earth remote sensing applications, J. Appl. Meteo. Clim., 47, 124-234, 2008.
Felicita Russo, formerly of 613.1 and recently graduated from UMBC with a PhD in Atmospheric Physics, submitted a paper resulting from her PhD work entitled "Measurements of cloud microphysical properties using a Raman lidar" to the Journal of Atmospheric and Oceanic Technology. The authors are Felicita Russo, David N. Whiteman (613.1), David D. Turner, Belay B. Demoz/ HU, Raymond M. Hoff/ UMBC-GEST, Igor Veselovskii (613.1/UMBC-GEST). David Whiteman was Dr. Russo's research advisor. Dr. Russo is now working in the lidar group at the National Research Council in Potenza, Italy.
Abstracts prepared for conferences
Submitted to the International Laser Radar Conference
Airborne and Ground-Based Measurements of Water Vapor and Aerosols Using a High-Performance Raman Lidar", D. N. Whiteman (613.1), K. Rush, S. Rabenhorst, M. Cadirola, D. Venable, R. Connel, I. Veselovskii, B. Demoz, T. Leblanc, H. Vömel, L. Miloshevich, E. Joseph.
The Water Vapor Variability - Satellite/Sondes (WAVES) Field Campaigns, D. N. Whiteman (613.1), M. Adam, C. Barnet, B. Bojkov (613.3/GEST), R. Delgado, B. Demoz, J. Fitzgibbon, R. Forno, R. Herman, R. Hoff, E. Joseph, E. Landulfo, K. McCann, T. McGee (613.3), L. Miloshevich, I. Restrepo, F. J. Schmidlin, B. Taubman, A. Thompson, L. Twigg, D. Venable, H. Vömel, C. Walthall.
Profiling of aerosol parameters inside the boundary layer by multi-wavelength lidar under varying conditions of hydroscopic growth, I. Veselovskii (613.1/UMBC-GEST), D.N. Whiteman (613.1), A. Kolgotin (1), B. Andrews (3), M. Korenskii(1).
Estimation of uncertainties introduced in lidar derived aerosol physical properties due to multiple scattering in the planetary boundary layer, V.Griaznov (1), M. Korenskii (1), I. Veselovskii (613.1/UMBC-GEST), D.N. Whiteman (613.1).
Proposals submitted
The research proposal "Collaborative Research: Rainfall estimation accuracy and classification from deep underwater sound measurements" was submitted to NSF. PIs:* Eyal Amitai** (613.1, GMU)*, Jeffrey Nystuen (APL/UW), Emmanouil N. Anagnostou (UCONN).
Education and Outreach
Eyal Amitai (613.1, GMU) gave a departmental seminar on “Utilizing UND Research Facilities for a Breakthrough in Radar Hydrology" at the Department of Atmospheric Sciences, University of North Dakota, Grand Forks, North Dakota on Feb 21.
David Starr (613.1) served as a science fair judge at Rockledge Elementary and David Whiteman (613.1) served as a science fair judge at Greenbelt Elementary and Robert Goddard French Immersion Schools. All three schools are in Prince George's County.
Print-friendly
page
(new window)
