Cloud-Resolving Modeling of Precipitation

Abstract

Precipitation has important impacts on people’s daily life and torrential ­precipitation could bring tremendous losses in economy and cause fatalities. Thus, precipitation always is one of the top priorities in operational forecast and scientific research. Precipitation is a result of convective development under a favorable environment. The unstable energy is accumulated with favorable environmental thermodynamic conditions when the clouds and associated precipitation are absent. The release of unstable energy drives the growth of clouds that eventually leads to precipitation. The development of clouds and precipitation has important feedback to the environment by redistributing temperature, water vapor, and momentum via radiative, cloud microphysical and dynamic processes. The precipitation processes are determined by environment thermal and water vapor conditions through cloud microphysical processes. The analysis of thermal, water vapor, and cloud microphysical budgets will enhance understanding of precipitation, which is beneficial to the improvement of quantitative precipitation forecast. However, important information such as cloud microphysical processes is not conventionally available, which make observational analysis rather difficult.