| NSF Org: |
AGS Division of Atmospheric and Geospace Sciences |
| Recipient: |
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| Initial Amendment Date: | August 26, 2020 |
| Latest Amendment Date: | August 23, 2023 |
| Award Number: | 2019858 |
| Award Instrument: | Standard Grant |
| Program Manager: |
Nicholas Anderson
nanderso@nsf.gov (703)292-4715 AGS Division of Atmospheric and Geospace Sciences GEO Directorate for Geosciences |
| Start Date: | January 1, 2021 |
| End Date: | December 31, 2024 (Estimated) |
| Total Intended Award Amount: | $293,489.00 |
| Total Awarded Amount to Date: | $346,937.00 |
| Funds Obligated to Date: |
FY 2023 = $53,448.00 |
| History of Investigator: |
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| Recipient Sponsored Research Office: |
400 HARVEY MITCHELL PKY S STE 300 COLLEGE STATION TX US 77845-4375 (979)862-6777 |
| Sponsor Congressional District: |
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| Primary Place of Performance: |
TX US 77845-4375 |
| 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 |
| Primary Program Source: |
01002021DB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT |
| 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
This award provides funding for an observational field experiment in the Houston, Texas area to study clouds and precipitation, and their dependence on environmental factors including small particulates known as aerosols. The Houston region represents a unique region of study, where isolated clouds and thunderstorms are common, there is a sea breeze due to the nearby Gulf of Mexico, and there are specific sources of aerosol due to urban and industrial emissions. The research team will deploy research aircraft, ground based radars, and a variety of other sensors to characterize the environment in and around growing clouds. The data will be analyzed and incorporated into numerical models to answer questions about the role of temperature, moisture, winds, and aerosols in the formation and development of clouds and precipitation. This research will help to improve high-resolution simulations of extreme or high-impact events in highly populated coastal regions. The research will also have wide relevance to climate models, where aerosol/cloud interactions are difficult to simulate. Early career researchers and students will gain experience in conducting observational research. Outreach activities will also provide opportunities for enhanced public awareness of thunderstorm and flooding hazards.
The Experiment of Sea Breeze Convection, Aerosols, Precipitation and Environment (ESCAPE) is planned for June and July 2021 in the Houston metropolitan area. ESCAPE will provide measurements that will be used symbiotically with high-resolution models to improve simulations of the lifecycle of isolated convective cells, including the effects of interactive aerosol, microphysical, and kinematic processes on observable cloud, precipitation, and electrification signatures. The research team plans to methodically advance observation-based understanding of fundamental convective cloud processes and aerosol impacts on these processes by deploying a host of instruments in a targeted geographic region. The main airborne platform would be the NSF/National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) C-130 research aircraft with a wide range of cloud microphysical measurements. On the ground, the PIs would coordinate multiple radars, radiosondes, swarmsondes, and the Houston Lightning Mapping Array. The campaign will coordinate with the Department of Energy deployment of the Atmospheric Radiation Measurement mobile facility and make use of existing measurements of air quality in the Houston area. The observational data would be combined with modeling using WRF and RAMS to address the following science objectives: 1) Investigate the control of meteorology, dynamics, and mixing on aerosol indirect effects on the early growth stage of convective clouds, 2) Characterize the environment and physical processes leading to coastal convective initiation, 3) Determine how mature convective updraft microphysical and kinematic properties relate to those earlier in the cloud lifecycle, its initiation mechanism, and heterogeneities of its parent environment, 4) Quantify environmental thermodynamic and kinematic controls on convective lifecycle properties under different aerosol conditions, 5) Quantify how: a) cold pool properties and lifetimes vary as a function of precipitation amounts and precipitation size distributions, and how are these relationships modulated by the relative humidity, b) what is the impact of aerosol number concentration on cold pool depth and intensity, and c) how do different land-surface types determine the dissipation of cold pools, 6) Characterize how the lightning flash size and energy depends on the modification of the supercooled liquid water content, scale and volume of the mixed-phase updraft, and hydrometeor populations.
This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.
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.
The overall goals of the collaborative project are to (a) investigate the control of meteorology, dynamics, and mixing on aerosol indirect effects on the early growth stage of convective clouds, (b) characterize the environment and physical processes leading to coastal convective initiation, (c) determine how mature convective updraft microphysical and kinematic properties relate to those earlier in the cloud lifecycle, its initiation mechanism, and heterogeneities of its parent environment, (d) quantify environmental thermodynamic and kinematic controls on convective lifecycle properties under different aerosol conditions, (e) quantify: (1) how cold pool properties and lifetimes vary as a function of precipitation amounts and precipitation size distributions, and how are these relationships modulated by the relative humidity, (2) what is the impact of aerosol number concentration on cold pool depth and intensity, and (3) how do different land-surface types determine the dissipation of cold pools, and (f) characterize how the lightning flash size and energy depends on the modification of the supercooled liquid water content, scale and volume of the mixed-phase updraft, and hydrometeor populations. Dr. Timothy Logan, co-PI, worked to specifically address (a), (b), and (f) by investigating the diurnal cycle of lightning activity over Southeast Texas and compare/contrast the electrical nature of sea breeze thunderstorms during NSF ESCAPE and DOE TRACER field campaigns which took place during the summer months of 2022. Methodology was developed during ESCAPE which consisted of (i) identifying “hotspots” of electrical activity using the Houston Lightning Mapping Array, (ii) merging lightning mapping array source/flash dataset with lightning charge structure datasets for individual thunderstorm cases, and (iii) determining how aerosols impact ice nucleation for the thunderstorm cases. Dr. Logan conducted a study on the 12 July and 13 July 2022 golden cases and found that ice nucleates at warmer temperatures under extreme aerosol loading conditions such as wildfire smoke. Smoke can enhance lightning activity and precipitation due to the overabundance of ice particles such as what happened during the 12 July 2022 case. Remnant smoke was in the vicinity of the thunderstorms which developed during the 13 July 2022 case and the ice nucleating properties were less perturbed which led to weaker lightning and precipitation. Dr. Logan added a broader impact investigation of how the aerosol invigoration effect can be observed using lightning as an indicator. This funded research study supported three successfully matriculated graduate students who submitted two journal articles with on being accepted and the other is currently under review (as of 4/2025). In addition, undergraduate student researchers have gone on to present their work during TRACER/ESCAPE and with several graduating to further their careers in academia and the public/private sector. Additional broader impacts include disseminating the results of this funded effort to other aerosol-cloud and lightning scientists, research personnel, the emergency management community, and communities within the confines of the Houston Lightning Mapping Array, especially underserved, vulnerable populations in terms of direct storm damage and flooding. Moreover, Dr. Logan has spoken at geoscience conferences, interacted with the media (e.g., science segments on major broadcasting networks and podcasts), and gave invited K-12 STEM presentations. Dr. Logan’s participation in this research effort provided support for mathematics and computer science undergraduate and graduate students and will continue to bear fruit in future collaborative endeavors.
Last Modified: 04/29/2025
Modified by: Timothy Logan
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