With the ability to extract the stratocumulus and cumulus clouds of interest under controlled meteorological conditions through the use of modis cloud regimes along with relevant measurements of…

This federal contract award, with ID 80NSSC18K1599, was granted to the University of Maryland Baltimore County (UMBC) by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Shared Services Center. The $210,329.86 grant funds research to determine the importance of decoupling in the extratropics and the radiative and climatic impact of these transitions in the extratropical boundary layer. The work leverages satellite data analysis to better understand cloud feedbacks, which is a high priority in climate science. The contract does not have a set-aside designation and is set to be completed by October 31, 2023. UMBC is a public research university that is part of the University System of Maryland, which has a history of providing research, measurement, and analytical services to support NASA programs across various domains.

With the ability to extract the stratocumulus and cumulus clouds of interest under controlled meteorological conditions through the use of modis cloud regimes along with relevant measurements of variables derived from amsr, airs, ceres and avhrr, we propose to determine the importance of decoupling in the extratropics. We then propose to determine the radiative and climatic impact of these transitions in the extratropical boundary layer using two different methods. The first method involves the use of cloud radiative kernels to compute a cloud optical depth feedback due to boundary layer decoupling. The second method involves the use of cloud subregimes to infer the influence of increasing surface temperature on cloud optical depth through boundary layer decoupling, from which cloud feedbacks can be inferred. Thus, the proposed work leverages the usage of clever diagnosis of satellite data to better understand the underlying physical mechanisms involved in cloud feedbacks, which is currently one of the highest priorities in climate science.