HR: 0800h
AN: A41C-0059    [Abstracts]
TI: Mechanisms regulating tropical tropospheric water vapor
AU: * Dessler, A E
EM: adessler@tamu.edu
AF: Dept. of Atmospheric Sciences, Texas A & M University, TAMU 3150, College Station, TX 77843 United States
AU: Minschwaner, K
EM: krm@kestrel.nmt.edu
AF: Dept. of Physics, New Mexico Tech, Socorro, NM 87801 United States
AB: We have analyzed tropical water vapor measurements made in the mid and upper troposphere by the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) onboard NASA's Aqua satellite. We compare the water vapor measurements to a simple trajectory simulation of water vapor, and show reasonable agreement. We conclude, in agreement with previous work, that the large-scale circulation is primarily responsible for the distribution of water vapor. By interpreting disagreements between AIRS and the model as being caused by processes not represented in the model, such as detailed microphysics, we can begin to get some idea of where in the atmosphere these missing processes are important.
DE: 0300 ATMOSPHERIC COMPOSITION AND STRUCTURE
DE: 0322 Constituent sources and sinks
DE: 0365 Troposphere: composition and chemistry
SC: Atmospheric Sciences [A]
MN: Fall Meeting 2005