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Stratospheric areal distribution of water vapor burden and the jet stream
Author(s) -
Kuhn P. M.,
Magaziner E.,
Stearns L. P.
Publication year - 1976
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/gl003i009p00529
Subject(s) - stratosphere , jet stream , longitude , troposphere , water vapor , atmospheric sciences , latitude , polar night , environmental science , jet (fluid) , observatory , polar vortex , climatology , geology , meteorology , geodesy , physics , astronomy , thermodynamics
Radiometrically inferred areal observations of the atmospheric water vapor burden have been made in the 270 to 520 cm −1 spectral band over western U. S. and the extreme eastern Pacific from the NASA C‐141 Kuiper Airborne Observatory. Before this very few observations from the upper troposphere and lower stratosphere over such a broad area have been made. 30600 individual observations from eight separate synoptic situations involving eight jet maxima were computer‐averaged over 2° latitude × 2° longitude boxes and related to the polar continental jet. Mean water vapor burdens ranged from 4.6×10 −4 g cm −2 to 14.3×10 −4 g cm −2 at 13.4 km with a striking peak just north of the jet wind maximum over a region of strong upward vertical motion.