| NSF Org: |
AGS Division of Atmospheric and Geospace Sciences |
| Recipient: |
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| Initial Amendment Date: | September 6, 2016 |
| Latest Amendment Date: | September 13, 2017 |
| Award Number: | 1628674 |
| Award Instrument: | Standard Grant |
| Program Manager: |
Eric DeWeaver
edeweave@nsf.gov (703)292-8527 AGS Division of Atmospheric and Geospace Sciences GEO Directorate for Geosciences |
| Start Date: | November 1, 2016 |
| End Date: | October 31, 2018 (Estimated) |
| Total Intended Award Amount: | $52,541.00 |
| Total Awarded Amount to Date: | $52,541.00 |
| Funds Obligated to Date: |
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| History of Investigator: |
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| Recipient Sponsored Research Office: |
506 S WRIGHT ST URBANA IL US 61801-3620 (217)333-2187 |
| Sponsor Congressional District: |
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| Primary Place of Performance: |
1901 S. First Street, Suite A Champaign IL US 61820-7473 |
| Primary Place of
Performance Congressional District: |
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| Unique Entity Identifier (UEI): |
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| Parent UEI: |
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| NSF Program(s): |
Physical & Dynamic Meteorology, Climate & Large-Scale Dynamics |
| Primary Program Source: |
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| Program Reference Code(s): |
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| Program Element Code(s): |
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| Award Agency Code: | 4900 |
| Fund Agency Code: | 4900 |
| Assistance Listing Number(s): | 47.050 |
ABSTRACT
The Southern Ocean (SO), meaning the global ocean of the high latitude Southern Hemisphere, has a well-deserved reputation as the stormiest place on earth. The remoteness of the SO and its unforgiving conditions have severely limited observations of atmospheric processes occurring above it, including cloud processes in the cyclones traveling along the South Polar front. Yet these processes are of interest for a variety of reasons, including the fact that SO clouds are relatively free from the effects of continental and anthropogenic aerosols, and the region is thus a natural laboratory for the study of cloud behavior under pristine conditions. SO clouds also play a significant cooling role in the energy balance of the planet by reflecting incoming sunlight back to space. There is evidence to suggest that this cooling has a long-range effect on the distribution of the low-latitude rainfall associated with the intertropical convergence zone, and that changes in SO cloudiness due to global climate change will affect the location and strength of the Southern Hemisphere jet stream. One indicator of our lack of understanding of SO cloud processes is the inadequate SO cloud cover found in climate model simulations, accompanied by excessive solar absorbtion by the ocean surface which may in turn cause errors in estimates of climate sensitivity.
This award funds planning and organizational activity for a field campaign titled Southern Ocean Clouds, Radiation, Aerosol, Transport Experimental Study (SOCRATES). The campaign itself is not yet funded, nor does NSF commit to funding it by making this award. By making the award NSF encourages the PIs to submit a set of proposals requesting support for each of the various campaign activities, which are reviewed collectively at a later date. This second round of reviews determines whether the campaign goes to the field and what elements of the campaign are supported by NSF.
The campaign consists of a deployment of the Gulfstream V (GV), a research aircraft maintained by the Earth Observing Laboratory of the National Center for Atmospheric Research, based either in Hobart, Australia or Christchurch, New Zealand. The GV would fly south across the polar front, reaching the colder waters beyond 55 degrees South, to obtain observations of atmospheric boundary layer structure and vertical distributions of clouds and aerosols, including cloud condensation nuclei (CCN) and ice nucleating particles (INPs). A key issue to be addressed in the campaign is the relative abundance of supercooled liquid water (SLW) droplets and ice particles in SO clouds, as SLW is more prevalent in SO clouds than their Northern Hemisphere counterparts. The PIs hypothesize that the extent to which SLW freezes at a given temperature is more strongly modulated by cloud updraft velocities than by availability of INPs. The PIs also seek to determine the relative influence of overlying free tropospheric aerosol concentrations versus local surface and boundary layer controls, including precipitation and wind speed, in determining the concentration of SLW droplets in boundary layer clouds. The GV is equipped with radar and lidar for characterizing cloud properties as well as instruments which use inlets on the aircraft to collect and analyze the chemical and physical properties of aerosols and cloud droplets and ice particles. The SOCRATES campaign is complementary to SO activities planned internationally and by other US agencies, including surface observations taken on ships and on MacQuarie Island, a small uninhabited island at 54 degrees South.
As noted above, the work has broader impacts due to the potentially significant role of SO clouds in determining the response of global climate to increases in greenhouse concentrations, and the inadequacy of SO clouds in climate models used for future climate projections. In addition, a number of education and outreach activities are planned for the campaign. Graduate students are expected to participate in the campaign through the awards given to PIs for fieldwork, and other opportunities for graduate student fieldwork will also be proposed. Summer internships for post-campaign data analysis will also be considered as part of the review process conducted for the campaign. In addition, outreach to K-12 students and the general public is planned through regular newsletters and blogs, and an interactive "Ask SOCRATES" website through which campaign PIs answer questions on clouds and their role in the climate system.
PROJECT OUTCOMES REPORT
Disclaimer
This Project Outcomes Report for the General Public is displayed verbatim as submitted by the Principal Investigator (PI) for this award. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this Report are those of the PI and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation; NSF has not approved or endorsed its content.
This grant was to support travel for the lead Principal Investigators to make field and logistics preparations in advance of a major NSF sponsored field campaign called the Southern Ocean Clouds Radiation Aerosol Transport Experimental Study (SOCRATES). The travel was completed in advance of the project. The grant also partially supported travel for University of Illinois investigators to participate in the field phase of the experiment. The SOCRATES field campaign and subsequent scientific analyses are being supported by other ongoing grants to Principal Investigators. The research had been underway for 8 months at the time this report was filed.
The SOCRATES campaign was conducted in January and February 2018, and collected data in the cold sector of Southern Ocean cyclones in a north-south curtain from Tasmania to a few degrees north of Antarctia. The goal of SOCRATES is to develop a scientific understanding of what controls the depth, amount and longevity of supercooled liquid water in Southern Ocean clouds using (1) measurements of clouds and aerosols obtained by probes on the National Science Foundation/National Center for Atmospheric Research Gulfstream-V (G-V) aircraft, (2) remote sensing of precipitation and clouds from the High-Performance Instrumented Airborne Platform for Environmental Research (HIAPER) Cloud Radar (HCR) and of clouds and aerosols from the High Spectral Resolution Lidar, (3) user-supplied instruments (cloud condensation nuclei (CCN), ice nucleating particle (INP), bulk mass and residuals from the Counterflow Virtual Impactor); (4) radiosondes from the R/V Investigator and dropsondes from the G-V; (5) high resolution 3D idealized simulations of cloud microphysical processes (6) back trajectories from the Weather Research and Forecasting model initiated with global reanalyses and (7) retrievals from the Himawari-8 and other satellites. These data are now being used to assess how in-situ distributions of the size, shape and phase of cloud particles and in-situ and retrieved cloud microphysical parameters vary with aerosol, INP and CCN concentrations above and below cloud, overlying free troposphere aerosol concentrations, temperature, humidity, wind speed, meteorology (e.g., location in cold sector, stratiform/cumuliform cloud) and location over the Southern Ocean. Researchers are also comparing the prevalence of SLW and its progression to ice over the SO with past arctic observations. Related modeling studies and sensitivity tests are assessing processes responsible for any observed correlations allowing the principal investigators to address hypotheses raised in the SOCRATES Science Project. Results from these studies will emerge as the research matures.
Last Modified: 11/06/2018
Modified by: Robert M Rauber
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