Modeling Mesoscale Cellular Structures and Drizzle in Marine Stratocumulus. Part II: The Microphysics and Dynamics of the Boundary Region between Open and Closed Cells

Abstract

Abstract This is the second of two companion papers on modeling of mesoscale cellular structures and drizzle in marine stratocumulus. In the first, aerosol–cloud–precipitation interactions and dynamical feedbacks were investigated to study the formation and evolution of open and closed cellular structures separately. In this paper, coexisting open and closed cells and how they influence one another are examined in a model domain of 180 × 60 × 1.5 km3. Simulations show that gradients in aerosol at the open–closed-cell boundary cause gradients in precipitation that generate a mesoscale circulation. The circulation promotes precipitation in the polluted closed cells but suppresses it in open cells by transporting water vapor to the closed-cell regime and carrying drier air and aerosol back to the open cells. The strength of this circulation depends on the contrast in precipitation under clean and polluted conditions at the boundary. Ship plumes emitted into clean, precipitating regions, simulated as a special case of a clean–polluted boundary, develop a similar circulation. Drizzle in the ship track is first suppressed by the increase in aerosol particles but later recovers and becomes even stronger because the local circulation enhances liquid water path owing to the convergence of water vapor from the region adjacent to the track. This circulation modifies the transport and mixing of ship plumes and enhances their dispersal. Finally, results show that whereas ship emissions do increase cloud albedo in regions of open cells, even the addition of very large aerosol concentrations cannot transform an open cellular structure to a closed one, for the case considered.