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Tropical Anvil Clouds: Radiative Driving Toward a Preferred State
Author(s) -
Sokol Adam B.,
Hartmann Dennis L.
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
journal of geophysical research: atmospheres
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 2169-8996
pISSN - 2169-897X
DOI - 10.1029/2020jd033107
Subject(s) - radiative transfer , atmospheric sciences , radiative flux , convection , radiative cooling , environmental science , lidar , ice cloud , cloud feedback , atmospheric radiative transfer codes , climatology , meteorology , physics , geology , remote sensing , climate change , climate model , climate sensitivity , optics , oceanography
The evolution of anvil clouds detrained from deep convective systems has important implications for the tropical energy balance and is thought to be shaped by radiative heating. We use combined radar‐lidar observations and a radiative transfer model to investigate the influence of radiative heating on anvil cloud altitude, thickness, and microphysical structure. We find that high clouds with an optical depth between 1 and 2 are prevalent in tropical convective regions and can persist far from any convective source. These clouds are generally located at higher altitudes than optically thicker clouds, experience strong radiative heating, and contain high concentrations of ice crystals indicative of turbulence. These findings support the hypothesis that anvil clouds are driven toward and maintained at a preferred optical thickness that corresponds to a positive cloud radiative effect. Comparison of daytime and nighttime observations suggests that anvil thinning proceeds more rapidly at night, when net radiative cooling promotes the sinking of cloud top. It is hypothesized that the properties of aged anvil clouds and their susceptibility to radiative destabilization are shaped by the time of day at which the cloud was detrained. These results underscore the importance of small‐scale processes in determining the radiative effect of tropical convection.