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Abstract Recent idealized modeling studies have highlighted the importance of explicitly simulating realistic convective boundary layer (CBL) structures to assess and represent their influence on mesoscale phenomena. The choice of lateral boundary conditions (LBCs) has a substantial impact on these turbulent structures, including the distribution of kinematic and thermodynamic properties within the CBL. While use of periodic LBCs is ideal, open LBCs are required for nonuniform domains (e.g., multiple air masses or land surface types). However, open LBCs result in an unrealistic, laminar CBL structure near the upstream boundary that undoubtedly impacts the evolution of any simulated phenomena. Therefore, there is a need for a modified open LBC option to mitigate this unrealistic structure, while still permitting users to simulate phenomena in nonuniform domains. The Pennsylvania State University–NCAR Cloud Model 1 (CM1), version 19.8, includes an optional inflow-nudging technique to nudge inflow to the base-state wind profile. For the present study, the authors modified this method to one that nudges toward a continually updated, horizontally averaged profile so that the technique may be used for phenomena under evolving conditions. Simulations using LBC choices, including nudging to either the base state or horizontal average, were evaluated relative to respective dual-periodic LBC control simulations with or without vertical wind shear. The horizontal average nudging technique outperformed the traditional open LBCs and nudging to the base state, as demonstrated using a histogram matching technique applied to grid points within the CBL. Ultimately, this work can be used to assist modelers in assessing which LBCs are appropriate for their intended use.
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Do Nudging Tendencies Depend on the Nudging Timescale Chosen in Atmospheric Models?
Abstract Nudging is a ubiquitous capability of numerical weather and climate models that is widely used in a variety of applications (e.g., crude data assimilation, “intelligent” interpolation between analysis times, constraining flow in tracer advection/diffusion simulations). Here, the focus is on the momentum nudging tendencies themselves, rather than the atmospheric state that results from application of the method. The initial intent was to interpret these tendencies as a quantitative estimate of model error (net parameterization error in particular). However, it was found that nudging tendencies depend strongly on the nudging time scale chosen, which is the primary result presented here. Reducing the nudging time scale reduces the difference between the model state and the target state, but much less so than the reduction in the nudging time scale, resulting in increased nudging tendencies. The dynamical core, in particular, appears to increasingly oppose nudging tendencies as the nudging time scale is reduced. A heuristic analysis suggests such a result should be expected as long as the state the model is trying to achieve differs from the target state, regardless of the type of target state (e.g., a reanalysis, another model). These results suggest nudging tendencies cannot bequantitativelyinterpreted as model error. Still, two experiments aimed at seeing how nudging can identify a withheld parameterization suggest nudging tendencies do contain some information on model errors and/or missing physical processes and still might be useful in model development and tuning, even if only qualitatively.
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- Award ID(s):
- 2004512
- PAR ID:
- 10373217
- Publisher / Repository:
- DOI PREFIX: 10.1029
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Journal of Advances in Modeling Earth Systems
- Volume:
- 14
- Issue:
- 10
- ISSN:
- 1942-2466
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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