EAGER: Opportunistic Soundings to Advance the Understanding of High-Shear Low-CAPE (Convective Available Potential Energy) Convective Environments

EAGER：机会性探测，以增进对高剪切低 CAPE（对流可用势能）对流环境的理解

• 批准号: 1530258
• 负责人: Matthew Parker
• 金额: $ 2.34万
• 依托单位: North Carolina State University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2015
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2015-04-01 至 2018-03-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1530258&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: EAGER; Opportunistic; Soundings; Advance; Understanding

Severe convective storms within environments characterized by large vertical wind shear and marginal convective available potential energy (so-called "high-shear, low-CAPE", or "HSLC" environments) present a substantial threat to society, and yet they remain poorly understood. Recent studies indicate that a substantial fraction of all severe weather reports, including significant tornadoes (EF2 or greater on the enhanced Fujita scale), occur within HSLC environments. HSLC conditions occur nationwide and throughout the year, but are particularly common during the cool season and overnight, when public awareness of the severe weather threat is low. Storms within HSLC environments also tend to be poorly sampled by radar due to their comparatively small spatial dimensions compared to higher-CAPE convection, with typical echo tops of 4-6 km AGL, and mesocyclones having widths and depths of only 2-4 km. Taken altogether, HSLC storms are a significant concern due to their potential severity, their typical occurrence during non-traditional times of the day and year, and the difficulties they present to radar-based warning operations. The gap in our knowledge base is manifested in terms of the relatively low skill of severe weather watches and warnings for HSLC storms. At the most basic level, HSLC forecasts are hindered because we have very little understanding of the fundamental processes governing HSLC storms and their interactions with the ambient environment. Without targeted observations of HSLC environments, our understanding of HSLC storms is unlikely to improve.The goal of this application is to undertake a program of local sounding measurements in HSLC environments at high temporal resolution. Operations will exploit the existing North Carolina State University (NCSU) sounding system, which will enable the research team to quickly coordinate launches and to target evolving cases at very low cost. The research team will use the collected data to quantify the environmental variability in HSLC regimes and identify the strengths and weaknesses of other proxy datasets that have heretofore been used for HSLC research.Intellectual Merit:HSLC severe weather is an important societal concern that requires further research. Unfortunately, a full basic research project addressing this problem is not likely until a baseline of quality observations has been made. HSLC environments are present for many hours each year, yet their conditional probability of producing severe weather on any given day is relatively low. Thus, rather than mounting an extended field campaign (which would no doubt have an unacceptable amount of "down time"), the research team will conduct an exploratory work that is inexpensive and is able to opportunistically target the most promising days within a region where HSLC convection is common. The project period will include two distinct cold seasons, maximizing the likelihood of sampling a diversity of HSLC environments during a short grant. This work is potentially transformative because it will produce the first set of temporally dense measurements ever made in HSLC environments, thereby serving as a foundation for future basic science.Broader Impacts:All sounding launches will be performed by NCSU students. In addition to incorporating graduate students from the research team, the PI serves as co-advisor for the student-run soundings club at NCSU. These students gain hands-on experience in preparing and launching soundings, as well as analyzing the data collected. Their current funding model only allows them to launch 2-4 soundings per year. The research team will invite the soundings club to participate in all launches, which will greatly enhance the number of available launch opportunities, and will provide educational data from interesting days with severe weather potential. The PI also will incorporate the data (often in near-real time) into his course on Mesoscale Meteorology.

以大型垂直风剪切和边际对流可用的势能（所谓的“高剪切，低镜头”或“ HSLC”环境）的环境中的严重对流风暴对社会构成了重大威胁，但它们仍然很众所周知。 最近的研究表明，在HSLC环境中，所有恶劣天气报告中的很大一部分，包括大量龙卷风（EF2或增强的藤田量表上）。 HSLC的状况在全年和全年都发生，但在凉爽的季节和一夜之间尤为普遍，当时公众对恶劣天气威胁的认识较低。 HSLC环境中的暴风雨也往往被雷达采样较差，因为与较高的对流相比，它们相对较小的空间尺寸，典型的回声顶部为4-6 km AGL，而中旋转频率仅为2-4 km。 HSLC的风暴完全是一个重大关注的问题，因为它们的潜在严重性，它们在白天和一年中的非传统时期的典型发生，以及它们在基于雷达的警告操作上遇到的困难。 我们知识库中的差距是根据对HSLC风暴的严重天气手表和警告的相对较低的技能表现出来的。 在最基本的层面上，HSLC的预测受到了阻碍，因为我们对管理HSLC风暴的基本过程及其与环境环境的相互作用几乎没有理解。 如果没有针对HSLC环境的有针对性的观察，我们对HSLC风暴的理解不太可能改善。该应用程序的目的是在高时间分辨率下进行HSLC环境中的局部声音测量计划。运营将利用现有的北卡罗来纳州立大学（NCSU）的声音系统，这将使研究团队能够快速协调发射并以非常低的成本来针对不断发展的案件。 研究小组将使用收集的数据来量化HSLC制度的环境变异性，并确定迄今已用于HSLC研究的其他代理数据集的优势和劣势。IntlectualFeerit：HSLC严重天气是需要进一步研究的重要社会问题。不幸的是，直到进行了质量观察的基线，就不太可能进行解决此问题的完整基础研究项目。 HSLC环境每年都存在许多小时，但是它们在任何一天都会产生恶劣天气的有条件概率相对较低。 因此，研究团队将不再进行扩展的现场运动（毫无疑问，这毫无疑问的“停机时间”）将进行一项廉价的探索性工作，并能够在HSLC对流很普遍的区域内进行机会主义目标。 该项目期间将包括两个不同的寒冷季节，最大程度地提高了在短暂赠款期间对HSLC环境采样多样性的可能性。这项工作具有潜在的变革性，因为它将产生在HSLC环境中进行的第一组时间密集的测量，从而成为未来基础科学的基础。BRODERIMPACTS：所有声音发布会将由NCSU学生进行。 除了合并研究团队的研究生外，PI还担任NCSU学生经营的Soundings俱乐部的联合顾问。这些学生在准备和启动声音以及分析收集的数据方面获得动手实践经验。 他们当前的资金模式只允许他们每年启动2-4个声音。 研究团队将邀请Soundings Club参加所有发布会，这将大大增加可用的发布机会的数量，并将提供具有严重天气潜力的有趣日子的教育数据。 PI还将将数据（通常在近乎真实的时间）纳入他的中尺度气象学课程。