Not listed FAST SCATTERING-BASED 3 D JACOBIAN RADIATIVE TRANSFER MODEL FOR COMPLEX HYDROMETEORS THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN SPACEBORNE DATA FROM PASSIVE AND ACTIVE SENSORS AND THE UNDERLYING SET OF ATMOSPHERIC VARIABLES PROVIDES A MEANS FOR ESTIMATION OF THESE VARIABLES USING EITHER RETRIEVAL ALGORITHMS OR RADIANCE ASSIMILATION METHODS. EITHER OF THESE APPLICATIONS REQUIRES THE USE OF AN ACCURATE FORWARD RADIATIVE TRANSFER MODEL CAPABLE OF PROCESSING PROFILES AT RATES SIMILAR TO OR EXCEEDING THE PIXEL RATE OF THE SENSOR ON MACHINES OF CONTEMPORARY COMPUTATIONAL SPEED AND WITH THE CAPABILITY TO PROVIDE THE SENSITIVITY FUNCTIONS JACOBIANS THAT DESCRIBE THE TANGENT LINEAR RESPONSE OF EACH OBSERVABLE TO EACH VARIABLE. MOREOVER THESE ALGORITHMS MUST FUNCTION WITH INHERENT NUMERICAL STABILITY AND REPEATABILITY UNDER CONDITIONS OF ARBITRARY MULTIPHASE HYDROMETEOR DISTRIBUTIONS AND WITH SEAMLESS TRANSITIONS TO CLEAR ATMOSPHERIC PROFILES. IN ORDER TO ADVANCE RADIATIVE TRANSFER SCIENCE AND RETRIEVAL AND ASSIMILATION CAPABILITIES SUCH MODELS SHOULD INCORPORATE THE EFFECTS OF HORIZONTAL CLOUD AND RAINCELL INHOMOGENEITIES. THESE CONSTRAINTS ALONG WITH THE NEED TO INCORPORATE EMISSION FROM DENSE SURFACE MEDIA AND ROUGH OCEAN SURFACES DROVE THE REQUIREMENTS OF THE UNIFIED MICROWAVE RADIATIVE TRANSFER UMRT ALGORITHM DEVELOPED BY THE CU CENTER FOR ENVIRONMENTAL TECHNOLOGY CET. THE UMRT FORWARD TRANSFER ENGINE PROVIDES A FAST LAYER ADDING 1 DIMENSIONAL SOLUTION TO THE RADIATIVE TRANSFER EQUATION IN AN ARBITRARILY SCATTERING MEDIUM WITH INHERENT STABILITY UNDER ALL ALBEDO CONDITIONS. USE OF MATRIX PERTURBATION METHODS PERMITS UMRT TO PROVIDE A FAST JACOBIAN CALCULATION THAT REUSES PREVIOUSLY COMPUTED MATRIX OPERATORS. IN ITS CURRENT FORM UMRT ASSUMES PLANAR STRATIFICATION AND SPHERICAL SCATTERING PARTICLES. IT IS A DETERMINISTIC ALGORITHM THAT IS IT DOES NOT USE MONTE CARLO METHODS. FOR THIS PROJECT THE UMRT WILL BE IMPROVED AND EXTENDED IN THE FOLLOWING CRITICAL WAYS: I THE DDSCAT DATABASE OF NON SPHERICAL HYDROMETEOR ABSORPTION SCATTERING AND PHASE MATRIX INFORMATION WILL BE INCORPORATED AS A FAST LOOKUP LIBRARY TO EXTEND APPLICABILITY OF UMRT OVER A WIDE RANGE OF HYDROMETEOR TYPES II A FAST FORWARD RADAR REFLECTIVITY OPERATOR WITH JACOBIAN WILL BE INCORPORATED TO PROVIDE APPLICABILITY TO ACTIVE SENSORS SUCH AS GPM DPR CLOUDSAT AND WITH APPROPRIATE CLOUD SCATTERING DATA BASES CALIPSO III A HORIZONTALLY INHOMOGENEOUS VERSION OF UMRT HI UMRT WILL BE DEVELOPED TO MODEL AND STUDY THE RADIATIVE EFFECTS OF HORIZONTALLY INHOMOGENEOUS CLOUDS NEAR RAIN BANDS AND CONVECTIVE TOWERS. TO DO SO AN OPTIMIZED HYBRID VERSION OF THE PLANAR STRATIFIED UMRT ENGINE AND A HORIZONTALLY INHOMOGENEOUS ITERATIVE PERTURBATION SOLUTION WILL BE DEVELOPED TO FACILITATE FAST FORWARD 3 DIMENSIONAL SIMULATIONS OF RADIATION AND REFLECTIVITY OVER CONVECTIVE CLOUDS AND MESOSCALE WEATHER EVENTS. THE HI UMRT MODEL WILL PROVIDE AN ADVANCED FAST RADIATIVE TRANSFER ENGINE TO BE USED WITHIN GPM AMSR 2 ATMS AND CLOUDSAT MICROWAVE RETRIEVALS AND DATA ASSIMILATION SCHEMES PATH AND ACE CLOUD ICE MISSION SIMULATIONS AS WELL AS POTENTIALLY BE ABLE TO BE EXTENDED TO IR OPTICAL SENSORS BY LATER INCORPORATION OF CLOUD AND AEROSOL SCATTERING DATA BASES. VALIDATION OF THE REVISED MODEL WILL BE PERFORMED USING EXISTING MICROWAVE DATA FROM THESE SATELLITES ALONG WITH OTHER RELEVANT AIRCRAFT DATA FROM E.G. GRIP AND PREVIOUS FIELD EXPERIMENTS. $0 2/7/18 4 FAST SCATTERING-BASED 3 D JACOBIAN RADIATIVE TRANSFER MODEL FOR COMPLEX HYDROMETEORS THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN SPACEBORNE DATA FROM PASSIVE AND ACTIVE SENSORS AND THE UNDERLYING SET OF ATMOSPHERIC VARIABLES PROVIDES A MEANS FOR ESTIMATION OF THESE VARIABLES USING EITHER RETRIEVAL ALGORITHMS OR RADIANCE ASSIMILATION METHODS. EITHER OF THESE APPLICATIONS REQUIRES THE USE OF AN ACCURATE FORWARD RADIATIVE TRANSFER MODEL CAPABLE OF PROCESSING PROFILES AT RATES SIMILAR TO OR EXCEEDING THE PIXEL RATE OF THE SENSOR, ON MACHINES OF CONTEMPORARY COMPUTATIONAL SPEED, AND WITH THE CAPABILITY TO PROVIDE THE SENSITIVITY FUNCTIONS JACOBIANS THAT DESCRIBE THE TANGENT LINEAR RESPONSE OF EACH OBSERVABLE TO EACH VARIABLE. MOREOVER, THESE ALGORITHMS MUST FUNCTION WITH INHERENT NUMERICAL STABILITY AND REPEATABILITY UNDER CONDITIONS OF ARBITRARY MULTIPHASE HYDROMETEOR DISTRIBUTIONS AND WITH SEAMLESS TRANSITIONS TO CLEAR ATMOSPHERIC PROFILES. IN ORDER TO ADVANCE RADIATIVE TRANSFER SCIENCE AND RETRIEVAL AND ASSIMILATION CAPABILITIES SUCH MODELS SHOULD INCORPORATE THE EFFECTS OF HORIZONTAL CLOUD AND RAINCELL INHOMOGENEITIES. THESE CONSTRAINTS, ALONG WITH THE NEED TO INCORPORATE EMISSION FROM DENSE SURFACE MEDIA AND ROUGH OCEAN SURFACES, DROVE THE REQUIREMENTS OF THE UNIFIED MICROWAVE RADIATIVE TRANSFER UMRT ALGORITHM DEVELOPED BY THE CU CENTER FOR ENVIRONMENTAL TECHNOLOGY CET. THE UMRT FORWARD TRANSFER ENGINE PROVIDES A FAST LAYER ADDING 1 DIMENSIONAL SOLUTION TO THE RADIATIVE TRANSFER EQUATION IN AN ARBITRARILY SCATTERING MEDIUM WITH INHERENT STABILITY UNDER ALL ALBEDO CONDITIONS. USE OF MATRIX PERTURBATION METHODS PERMITS UMRT TO PROVIDE A FAST JACOBIAN CALCULATION THAT REUSES PREVIOUSLY COMPUTED MATRIX OPERATORS. IN ITS CURRENT FORM UMRT ASSUMES PLANAR STRATIFICATION AND SPHERICAL SCATTERING PARTICLES. IT IS A DETERMINISTIC ALGORITHM, THAT IS, IT DOES NOT USE MONTE CARLO METHODS. FOR THIS PROJECT THE UMRT WILL BE IMPROVED AND EXTENDED IN THE FOLLOWING CRITICAL WAYS: I THE DDSCAT DATABASE OF NON SPHERICAL HYDROMETEOR ABSORPTION, SCATTERING, AND PHASE MATRIX INFORMATION WILL BE INCORPORATED AS A FAST LOOKUP LIBRARY TO EXTEND APPLICABILITY OF UMRT OVER A WIDE RANGE OF HYDROMETEOR TYPES, II A FAST FORWARD RADAR REFLECTIVITY OPERATOR WITH JACOBIAN WILL BE INCORPORATED TO PROVIDE APPLICABILITY TO ACTIVE SENSORS SUCH AS GPM DPR, CLOUDSAT, AND WITH APPROPRIATE CLOUD SCATTERING DATA BASES CALIPSO, III A HORIZONTALLY INHOMOGENEOUS VERSION OF UMRT HI UMRT WILL BE DEVELOPED TO MODEL AND STUDY THE RADIATIVE EFFECTS OF HORIZONTALLY INHOMOGENEOUS CLOUDS NEAR RAIN BANDS AND CONVECTIVE TOWERS. TO DO SO, AN OPTIMIZED HYBRID VERSION OF THE PLANAR STRATIFIED UMRT ENGINE AND A HORIZONTALLY INHOMOGENEOUS ITERATIVE PERTURBATION SOLUTION WILL BE DEVELOPED TO FACILITATE FAST FORWARD 3 DIMENSIONAL SIMULATIONS OF RADIATION AND REFLECTIVITY OVER CONVECTIVE CLOUDS AND MESOSCALE WEATHER EVENTS. THE HI UMRT MODEL WILL PROVIDE AN ADVANCED FAST RADIATIVE TRANSFER ENGINE TO BE USED WITHIN GPM, AMSR 2, ATMS, AND CLOUDSAT MICROWAVE RETRIEVALS AND DATA ASSIMILATION SCHEMES, PATH AND ACE CLOUD ICE MISSION SIMULATIONS, AS WELL AS POTENTIALLY BE ABLE TO BE EXTENDED TO IR OPTICAL SENSORS BY LATER INCORPORATION OF CLOUD AND AEROSOL SCATTERING DATA BASES. VALIDATION OF THE REVISED MODEL WILL BE PERFORMED USING EXISTING MICROWAVE DATA FROM THESE SATELLITES ALONG WITH OTHER RELEVANT AIRCRAFT DATA FROM E.G. GRIP AND PREVIOUS FIELD EXPERIMENTS. Other Administrative Action $0 2/7/18 3 FAST SCATTERING-BASED 3 D JACOBIAN RADIATIVE TRANSFER MODEL FOR COMPLEX HYDROMETEORS THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN SPACEBORNE DATA FROM PASSIVE AND ACTIVE SENSORS AND THE UNDERLYING SET OF ATMOSPHERIC VARIABLES PROVIDES A MEANS FOR ESTIMATION OF THESE VARIABLES USING EITHER RETRIEVAL ALGORITHMS OR RADIANCE ASSIMILATION METHODS. EITHER OF THESE APPLICATIONS REQUIRES THE USE OF AN ACCURATE FORWARD RADIATIVE TRANSFER MODEL CAPABLE OF PROCESSING PROFILES AT RATES SIMILAR TO OR EXCEEDING THE PIXEL RATE OF THE SENSOR, ON MACHINES OF CONTEMPORARY COMPUTATIONAL SPEED, AND WITH THE CAPABILITY TO PROVIDE THE SENSITIVITY FUNCTIONS JACOBIANS THAT DESCRIBE THE TANGENT LINEAR RESPONSE OF EACH OBSERVABLE TO EACH VARIABLE. MOREOVER, THESE ALGORITHMS MUST FUNCTION WITH INHERENT NUMERICAL STABILITY AND REPEATABILITY UNDER CONDITIONS OF ARBITRARY MULTIPHASE HYDROMETEOR DISTRIBUTIONS AND WITH SEAMLESS TRANSITIONS TO CLEAR ATMOSPHERIC PROFILES. IN ORDER TO ADVANCE RADIATIVE TRANSFER SCIENCE AND RETRIEVAL AND ASSIMILATION CAPABILITIES SUCH MODELS SHOULD INCORPORATE THE EFFECTS OF HORIZONTAL CLOUD AND RAINCELL INHOMOGENEITIES. THESE CONSTRAINTS, ALONG WITH THE NEED TO INCORPORATE EMISSION FROM DENSE SURFACE MEDIA AND ROUGH OCEAN SURFACES, DROVE THE REQUIREMENTS OF THE UNIFIED MICROWAVE RADIATIVE TRANSFER UMRT ALGORITHM DEVELOPED BY THE CU CENTER FOR ENVIRONMENTAL TECHNOLOGY CET. THE UMRT FORWARD TRANSFER ENGINE PROVIDES A FAST LAYER ADDING 1 DIMENSIONAL SOLUTION TO THE RADIATIVE TRANSFER EQUATION IN AN ARBITRARILY SCATTERING MEDIUM WITH INHERENT STABILITY UNDER ALL ALBEDO CONDITIONS. USE OF MATRIX PERTURBATION METHODS PERMITS UMRT TO PROVIDE A FAST JACOBIAN CALCULATION THAT REUSES PREVIOUSLY COMPUTED MATRIX OPERATORS. IN ITS CURRENT FORM UMRT ASSUMES PLANAR STRATIFICATION AND SPHERICAL SCATTERING PARTICLES. IT IS A DETERMINISTIC ALGORITHM, THAT IS, IT DOES NOT USE MONTE CARLO METHODS. FOR THIS PROJECT THE UMRT WILL BE IMPROVED AND EXTENDED IN THE FOLLOWING CRITICAL WAYS: I THE DDSCAT DATABASE OF NON SPHERICAL HYDROMETEOR ABSORPTION, SCATTERING, AND PHASE MATRIX INFORMATION WILL BE INCORPORATED AS A FAST LOOKUP LIBRARY TO EXTEND APPLICABILITY OF UMRT OVER A WIDE RANGE OF HYDROMETEOR TYPES, II A FAST FORWARD RADAR REFLECTIVITY OPERATOR WITH JACOBIAN WILL BE INCORPORATED TO PROVIDE APPLICABILITY TO ACTIVE SENSORS SUCH AS GPM DPR, CLOUDSAT, AND WITH APPROPRIATE CLOUD SCATTERING DATA BASES CALIPSO, III A HORIZONTALLY INHOMOGENEOUS VERSION OF UMRT HI UMRT WILL BE DEVELOPED TO MODEL AND STUDY THE RADIATIVE EFFECTS OF HORIZONTALLY INHOMOGENEOUS CLOUDS NEAR RAIN BANDS AND CONVECTIVE TOWERS. TO DO SO, AN OPTIMIZED HYBRID VERSION OF THE PLANAR STRATIFIED UMRT ENGINE AND A HORIZONTALLY INHOMOGENEOUS ITERATIVE PERTURBATION SOLUTION WILL BE DEVELOPED TO FACILITATE FAST FORWARD 3 DIMENSIONAL SIMULATIONS OF RADIATION AND REFLECTIVITY OVER CONVECTIVE CLOUDS AND MESOSCALE WEATHER EVENTS. THE HI UMRT MODEL WILL PROVIDE AN ADVANCED FAST RADIATIVE TRANSFER ENGINE TO BE USED WITHIN GPM, AMSR 2, ATMS, AND CLOUDSAT MICROWAVE RETRIEVALS AND DATA ASSIMILATION SCHEMES, PATH AND ACE CLOUD ICE MISSION SIMULATIONS, AS WELL AS POTENTIALLY BE ABLE TO BE EXTENDED TO IR OPTICAL SENSORS BY LATER INCORPORATION OF CLOUD AND AEROSOL SCATTERING DATA BASES. VALIDATION OF THE REVISED MODEL WILL BE PERFORMED USING EXISTING MICROWAVE DATA FROM THESE SATELLITES ALONG WITH OTHER RELEVANT AIRCRAFT DATA FROM E.G. GRIP AND PREVIOUS FIELD EXPERIMENTS. Other Administrative Action $0 9/20/17 Not listed FAST SCATTERING-BASED 3 D JACOBIAN RADIATIVE TRANSFER MODEL FOR COMPLEX HYDROMETEORS THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN SPACEBORNE DATA FROM PASSIVE AND ACTIVE SENSORS AND THE UNDERLYING SET OF ATMOSPHERIC VARIABLES PROVIDES A MEANS FOR ESTIMATION OF THESE VARIABLES USING EITHER RETRIEVAL ALGORITHMS OR RADIANCE ASSIMILATION METHODS. EITHER OF THESE APPLICATIONS REQUIRES THE USE OF AN ACCURATE FORWARD RADIATIVE TRANSFER MODEL CAPABLE OF PROCESSING PROFILES AT RATES SIMILAR TO OR EXCEEDING THE PIXEL RATE OF THE SENSOR ON MACHINES OF CONTEMPORARY COMPUTATIONAL SPEED AND WITH THE CAPABILITY TO PROVIDE THE SENSITIVITY FUNCTIONS JACOBIANS THAT DESCRIBE THE TANGENT LINEAR RESPONSE OF EACH OBSERVABLE TO EACH VARIABLE. MOREOVER THESE ALGORITHMS MUST FUNCTION WITH INHERENT NUMERICAL STABILITY AND REPEATABILITY UNDER CONDITIONS OF ARBITRARY MULTIPHASE HYDROMETEOR DISTRIBUTIONS AND WITH SEAMLESS TRANSITIONS TO CLEAR ATMOSPHERIC PROFILES. IN ORDER TO ADVANCE RADIATIVE TRANSFER SCIENCE AND RETRIEVAL AND ASSIMILATION CAPABILITIES SUCH MODELS SHOULD INCORPORATE THE EFFECTS OF HORIZONTAL CLOUD AND RAINCELL INHOMOGENEITIES. THESE CONSTRAINTS ALONG WITH THE NEED TO INCORPORATE EMISSION FROM DENSE SURFACE MEDIA AND ROUGH OCEAN SURFACES DROVE THE REQUIREMENTS OF THE UNIFIED MICROWAVE RADIATIVE TRANSFER UMRT ALGORITHM DEVELOPED BY THE CU CENTER FOR ENVIRONMENTAL TECHNOLOGY CET. THE UMRT FORWARD TRANSFER ENGINE PROVIDES A FAST LAYER ADDING 1 DIMENSIONAL SOLUTION TO THE RADIATIVE TRANSFER EQUATION IN AN ARBITRARILY SCATTERING MEDIUM WITH INHERENT STABILITY UNDER ALL ALBEDO CONDITIONS. USE OF MATRIX PERTURBATION METHODS PERMITS UMRT TO PROVIDE A FAST JACOBIAN CALCULATION THAT REUSES PREVIOUSLY COMPUTED MATRIX OPERATORS. IN ITS CURRENT FORM UMRT ASSUMES PLANAR STRATIFICATION AND SPHERICAL SCATTERING PARTICLES. IT IS A DETERMINISTIC ALGORITHM THAT IS IT DOES NOT USE MONTE CARLO METHODS. FOR THIS PROJECT THE UMRT WILL BE IMPROVED AND EXTENDED IN THE FOLLOWING CRITICAL WAYS: I THE DDSCAT DATABASE OF NON SPHERICAL HYDROMETEOR ABSORPTION SCATTERING AND PHASE MATRIX INFORMATION WILL BE INCORPORATED AS A FAST LOOKUP LIBRARY TO EXTEND APPLICABILITY OF UMRT OVER A WIDE RANGE OF HYDROMETEOR TYPES II A FAST FORWARD RADAR REFLECTIVITY OPERATOR WITH JACOBIAN WILL BE INCORPORATED TO PROVIDE APPLICABILITY TO ACTIVE SENSORS SUCH AS GPM DPR CLOUDSAT AND WITH APPROPRIATE CLOUD SCATTERING DATA BASES CALIPSO III A HORIZONTALLY INHOMOGENEOUS VERSION OF UMRT HI UMRT WILL BE DEVELOPED TO MODEL AND STUDY THE RADIATIVE EFFECTS OF HORIZONTALLY INHOMOGENEOUS CLOUDS NEAR RAIN BANDS AND CONVECTIVE TOWERS. TO DO SO AN OPTIMIZED HYBRID VERSION OF THE PLANAR STRATIFIED UMRT ENGINE AND A HORIZONTALLY INHOMOGENEOUS ITERATIVE PERTURBATION SOLUTION WILL BE DEVELOPED TO FACILITATE FAST FORWARD 3 DIMENSIONAL SIMULATIONS OF RADIATION AND REFLECTIVITY OVER CONVECTIVE CLOUDS AND MESOSCALE WEATHER EVENTS. THE HI UMRT MODEL WILL PROVIDE AN ADVANCED FAST RADIATIVE TRANSFER ENGINE TO BE USED WITHIN GPM AMSR 2 ATMS AND CLOUDSAT MICROWAVE RETRIEVALS AND DATA ASSIMILATION SCHEMES PATH AND ACE CLOUD ICE MISSION SIMULATIONS AS WELL AS POTENTIALLY BE ABLE TO BE EXTENDED TO IR OPTICAL SENSORS BY LATER INCORPORATION OF CLOUD AND AEROSOL SCATTERING DATA BASES. VALIDATION OF THE REVISED MODEL WILL BE PERFORMED USING EXISTING MICROWAVE DATA FROM THESE SATELLITES ALONG WITH OTHER RELEVANT AIRCRAFT DATA FROM E.G. GRIP AND PREVIOUS FIELD EXPERIMENTS. $0 9/20/17 Not listed FAST SCATTERING-BASED 3 D JACOBIAN RADIATIVE TRANSFER MODEL FOR COMPLEX HYDROMETEORS THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN SPACEBORNE DATA FROM PASSIVE AND ACTIVE SENSORS AND THE UNDERLYING SET OF ATMOSPHERIC VARIABLES PROVIDES A MEANS FOR ESTIMATION OF THESE VARIABLES USING EITHER RETRIEVAL ALGORITHMS OR RADIANCE ASSIMILATION METHODS. EITHER OF THESE APPLICATIONS REQUIRES THE USE OF AN ACCURATE FORWARD RADIATIVE TRANSFER MODEL CAPABLE OF PROCESSING PROFILES AT RATES SIMILAR TO OR EXCEEDING THE PIXEL RATE OF THE SENSOR ON MACHINES OF CONTEMPORARY COMPUTATIONAL SPEED AND WITH THE CAPABILITY TO PROVIDE THE SENSITIVITY FUNCTIONS JACOBIANS THAT DESCRIBE THE TANGENT LINEAR RESPONSE OF EACH OBSERVABLE TO EACH VARIABLE. MOREOVER THESE ALGORITHMS MUST FUNCTION WITH INHERENT NUMERICAL STABILITY AND REPEATABILITY UNDER CONDITIONS OF ARBITRARY MULTIPHASE HYDROMETEOR DISTRIBUTIONS AND WITH SEAMLESS TRANSITIONS TO CLEAR ATMOSPHERIC PROFILES. IN ORDER TO ADVANCE RADIATIVE TRANSFER SCIENCE AND RETRIEVAL AND ASSIMILATION CAPABILITIES SUCH MODELS SHOULD INCORPORATE THE EFFECTS OF HORIZONTAL CLOUD AND RAINCELL INHOMOGENEITIES. THESE CONSTRAINTS ALONG WITH THE NEED TO INCORPORATE EMISSION FROM DENSE SURFACE MEDIA AND ROUGH OCEAN SURFACES DROVE THE REQUIREMENTS OF THE UNIFIED MICROWAVE RADIATIVE TRANSFER UMRT ALGORITHM DEVELOPED BY THE CU CENTER FOR ENVIRONMENTAL TECHNOLOGY CET. THE UMRT FORWARD TRANSFER ENGINE PROVIDES A FAST LAYER ADDING 1 DIMENSIONAL SOLUTION TO THE RADIATIVE TRANSFER EQUATION IN AN ARBITRARILY SCATTERING MEDIUM WITH INHERENT STABILITY UNDER ALL ALBEDO CONDITIONS. USE OF MATRIX PERTURBATION METHODS PERMITS UMRT TO PROVIDE A FAST JACOBIAN CALCULATION THAT REUSES PREVIOUSLY COMPUTED MATRIX OPERATORS. IN ITS CURRENT FORM UMRT ASSUMES PLANAR STRATIFICATION AND SPHERICAL SCATTERING PARTICLES. IT IS A DETERMINISTIC ALGORITHM THAT IS IT DOES NOT USE MONTE CARLO METHODS. FOR THIS PROJECT THE UMRT WILL BE IMPROVED AND EXTENDED IN THE FOLLOWING CRITICAL WAYS: I THE DDSCAT DATABASE OF NON SPHERICAL HYDROMETEOR ABSORPTION SCATTERING AND PHASE MATRIX INFORMATION WILL BE INCORPORATED AS A FAST LOOKUP LIBRARY TO EXTEND APPLICABILITY OF UMRT OVER A WIDE RANGE OF HYDROMETEOR TYPES II A FAST FORWARD RADAR REFLECTIVITY OPERATOR WITH JACOBIAN WILL BE INCORPORATED TO PROVIDE APPLICABILITY TO ACTIVE SENSORS SUCH AS GPM DPR CLOUDSAT AND WITH APPROPRIATE CLOUD SCATTERING DATA BASES CALIPSO III A HORIZONTALLY INHOMOGENEOUS VERSION OF UMRT HI UMRT WILL BE DEVELOPED TO MODEL AND STUDY THE RADIATIVE EFFECTS OF HORIZONTALLY INHOMOGENEOUS CLOUDS NEAR RAIN BANDS AND CONVECTIVE TOWERS. TO DO SO AN OPTIMIZED HYBRID VERSION OF THE PLANAR STRATIFIED UMRT ENGINE AND A HORIZONTALLY INHOMOGENEOUS ITERATIVE PERTURBATION SOLUTION WILL BE DEVELOPED TO FACILITATE FAST FORWARD 3 DIMENSIONAL SIMULATIONS OF RADIATION AND REFLECTIVITY OVER CONVECTIVE CLOUDS AND MESOSCALE WEATHER EVENTS. THE HI UMRT MODEL WILL PROVIDE AN ADVANCED FAST RADIATIVE TRANSFER ENGINE TO BE USED WITHIN GPM AMSR 2 ATMS AND CLOUDSAT MICROWAVE RETRIEVALS AND DATA ASSIMILATION SCHEMES PATH AND ACE CLOUD ICE MISSION SIMULATIONS AS WELL AS POTENTIALLY BE ABLE TO BE EXTENDED TO IR OPTICAL SENSORS BY LATER INCORPORATION OF CLOUD AND AEROSOL SCATTERING DATA BASES. VALIDATION OF THE REVISED MODEL WILL BE PERFORMED USING EXISTING MICROWAVE DATA FROM THESE SATELLITES ALONG WITH OTHER RELEVANT AIRCRAFT DATA FROM E.G. GRIP AND PREVIOUS FIELD EXPERIMENTS. $30.0k 4/7/17