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CloudSat shedding new light on high‐reaching tropical deep convection observed with Meteosat
Author(s) -
Chung EuiSeok,
Sohn ByungJu,
Schmetz Johannes
Publication year - 2008
Publication title -
geophysical research letters
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.007
H-Index - 273
eISSN - 1944-8007
pISSN - 0094-8276
DOI - 10.1029/2007gl032516
Subject(s) - deep convection , convection , environmental science , remote sensing , climatology , meteorology , atmospheric sciences , geology , physics
Characteristics of warmer water vapor pixels (WWVPs) defined by brightness temperature difference (ΔTB) between 6.2 μ m and 10.8 μ m channel of Meteosat‐8 greater than zero were examined using collocated CloudSat data during the period from 15 October to 15 November 2006 over tropical Africa. On the basis of CloudSat we provide a physical interpretation of ΔTB > 0. It is found that WWVPs occur in deep convective areas where cloud tops are in the tropical tropopause layer above 14 km. It is also found that the relationship between 10.8 μ m TB and ΔTB is generally linear and WWVPs are frequent with very cold cloud top temperatures lower than the cold‐point tropopause temperature. These findings suggest that WWVPs are explained by the contrast between colder background of 10.8 μ m TB associated with overshooting tropical deep convection and warmer water vapor channel temperature due to the emission from water vapor lines in the warmer stratosphere above.