• Journal of the Korean earth science society
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• v.23 no.1
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• pp.59-71
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• 2002

Theoretical models of radiative transfer are developed to simulate the 85 GHz brightness temperature (T85) observed by the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) Microwave Imager (TMI) radiometer as a function of rain rate. These simulations are performed separately over regions of the convective and stratiform rain. TRMM Precipitation Radar (PR) observations are utilized to construct vertical profiles of hydrometeors in the regions. For a given rain rate, the extinction in 85 GHz due to hydrometeors above the freezing level is found to be relatively weak in the convective regions compared to that in the stratiform. The hydrometeor profile above the freezing level responsible for the weak extinction in convective regions is inferred from theoretical considerations to contain two layers: 1) a mixed (or mixed-phase) layer of 2 km thickness with mixed-phase particles, liquid drops and graupel above the freezing level, and 2) a layer of graupel extending from the top of the mixed layer to the cloud top. Strong extinction in the stratiform regions is inferred to result from slowly-falling, low-density ice aggregates (snow) above the freezing level. These theoretical results are consistent with the T85 measured by TMI, and with the rain rate deduced from PR for the convective and stratiform rain regions. On the basis of this study, the accuracy of the rain rate sensed by TMI is inferred to depend critically on the specification of the convective or stratiform nature of the rain.

• Atmosphere
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• v.20 no.3
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• pp.333-341
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• 2010

The stratiform rain fraction is investigated in the tropical boreal winter Madden-Julian oscillation (MJO) and summer intraseasonal oscillation (ISO) using Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) Precipitation Rader data for the 11-yr period from 1998 to 2008. Composite analysis shows that the MJO/ISO produces larger stratiform rain rate than convective rain rate for nearly all phases following the propagating MJO/ISO deep clouds, with the greatest stratiform rainfall amount when the MJO/ISO center is located over the central-eastern Indian Ocean and the western Pacific. The fraction of the intraseasonally filtered stratiform rainfall compared to total rainfall (i.e., convective plus stratiform rainfall) amounts to 53~56%, which is 13~16% larger than the stratiform rain fraction estimated for the same data on seasonal-to-annual time scales by Schumacher and Houze. This indicates that the MJO/ISO exhibits the organized rainfall process which is characterized by the shallow convection/heating at the incipient phase and the subsequent flare-up of strong deep convection, followed by the development of stratiform clouds at the upper troposphere.

• Journal of the Korean earth science society
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• v.32 no.1
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• pp.33-45
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• 2011

The characteristics and vertical structure of the rainfall are examined in terms of rain types using TRMM (Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission) PR (Precipitation Radar) data during the JJA period of 2002-2006 over three different regions; midlatitude region around the Korean Peninsula (EA1), subtropical East Asia (EA2), and tropical East Asia (EA3). The convective rain fraction in the EA1 region is 12.2%, which is smaller by 6% than those in the EA2 and EA3 regions. EA1 shows less frequent convective rain events, which are about 0.5 times as many as those in EA3. EA1 produces the mean convective rain rate of 10.4 mm/h that is about 40% larger than EA2 and EA3 while all regions have similar mean stratiform rain rate. The relationships between storm height and rain rate indicate that the rain rate is proportional to the storm height. Based on the vertical structure of radar reflectivity, EA1 produces deeper and stronger convective clouds with higher rain rate compared to the other regions. In EA3, radar reflectivity increases distinctly toward the land surface at altitude below 5 km, indicating more dominant coalescence-collision processes than the other regions. Furthermore, the bright band of stratiform rain clouds in EA3 is very distinct. In convective rain clouds, the first EOFs of radar reflectivity profiles are similar among the three regions, while the second EOFs are slightly different. The larger variability exists at upper layers for EA1 while it exits at lower levels for EA3.

• Atmosphere
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• v.24 no.4
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• pp.457-470
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• 2014

Thermodynamic conditions related with localized torrential rainfall in the middle west region of Korean peninsula are examined using radar rain rate and radiosonde observational data. Localized torrential rainfall events in this study are defined by three criteria base on 1) any one of Automated Synoptic Observing System (ASOS) hourly rainfall exceeds $30mmhr^{-1}$ around Osan, 2) the rain (> $1mmhr^{-1}$) area estimated from radar reflectivity is less than $20,000km^2$, and 3) the rain (> $10mmhr^{-1}$) cell is detected clearly and duration is short than 24 hr. As a result, 13 cases were selected during the summer season of 10 years (2004-13). It was found that the duration, the maximum rain area, and the maximum volumetric rain rate of convective cells (> $30mmhr^{-1}$) are less than 9hr, smaller than $1,000km^2$, and $15,000{\sim}60,000m^3s^{-1}$ in these cases. And a majority of cases shows the following thermodynamic characteristics: 1) Convective Available Potential Energy (CAPE) > $800Jkg^{-1}$, 2) Convective Inhibition (CIN) < $40Jkg^{-1}$, 3) Total Precipitable Water (TPW) ${\approx}$ 55 mm, and 4) Storm Relative Helicity (SRH) < $120m^2s^{-2}$. These cases mostly occurred in the afternoon. These thermodynamic conditions indicated that these cases were caused by strong atmospheric instability, lifting to overcome CIN, and sufficient moisture. The localized torrential rainfall occurred with deep moisture convection result from the instability caused by convective heating.

• Proceedings of the KSRS Conference
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• 2002.10a
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• pp.361-365
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• 2002

Rain-rate retrieval using the NOAA/AMSU (Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit) (Zaho et al., 2001) has been implemented at METRI/KMA since 2001. Here, we present the results of the AMSU derived rain-rate and validation result, especially for the rainfall associated with the tropical cyclone for 2001. For the validation, we use rain-rate derived from the ground based radar and/or rainfall observation from the rain gauge in Korea. We estimate the bias score, threat score, bias, RMSE and correlation coefficient for total of 16 tropical cyclone cases. Bias score shows around 1.3 and it increases with the increasing threshold value of rain-rate, while the threat score extends from 0.4 to 0.6 with the increasing threshold value of precipitation. The averaged rain-rate for at all 16 cases is 3.96mm/hr and 1.41mm/hr for the retrieved from AMSU and the ground observation, respectively. On the other hand, AMSU rain-rate shows a much better agreement with the ground based observation over inner part of tropical cyclone than over the outer part (Correlation coefficient for convective region is about 0.7, while it is only about 0.3 over the stratiform region). The larger discrepancy of tile correlation coefficient with the different part of the tropical cyclone is partly due to the time difference in between ice water path and surface rainfall. This results indicates that it might be better to develop the algorithm for different rain classes such as convective and stratiform.

• Proceedings of the KSRS Conference
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• 1999.11a
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• pp.117-121
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• 1999

Relations between GMS-5 infrared brightness temperature with SSM/I retrieved rain rate are determined by a probability matching method similar to Atlas et al. and Crosson et al. For this study, coincident data sets of the GMS-5 infrared measurements and SSM/I data during two summer seasons of 1997 and 1998 are constructed. The cumulative density functions (CDFs) of infrared brightness temperature and rain rate are matched at pairs of two variables which give the same percentile contribution. The method was applied for estimating rain rate on 31 July 1998, examining heavy rainfall estimation of a flash flood event over Mt. Jiri. Results were compared with surface gauge observations run by Korean Meteorological Administration. It was noted that the method produced reasonably good quality of rain estimate, however, there was large area giving false rain due to the anvil type clouds surrounding deep convective clouds. Extensive validation against surface rain observation is currently under investigation.

• Journal of the Korean earth science society
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• v.24 no.1
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• pp.30-35
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• 2003

The preliminary results of the study on the physics of rain using disdrometer data are shown for an area located on the northern coastal board of Macei${\acute{o}}$, Alagoas (9$^{\circ}$33'17.24' and 35$^{\circ}$46'54.84' W), at approximately 80 meters above the sea level. The data were obtained during January 2002 using a disdrometer RD-69 (Joss-Waldvogel). After definining the criteria for determining rain type (convective and stratiform), a set of Z-R pairs was analyzed for estimating the Z-R relation for each rain type. The results were quite similar to those for other regions of the globe. This preliminary analysis will be used to study the structure of rain with the meteorological radar as well as to permit a better understanding of the physics of tropical rain.

• Journal of information and communication convergence engineering
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• v.4 no.1
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• pp.41-45
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• 2006

A disdrometer has been used to determine Z-R relationships for the weather radar, which is unique coastal radar operating regularly in western tropical south Atlantic. Rainfall rates were divided into the stratiform rain and the convective rain on the basis of $10\;mm\;h^{-1}$. The Z-R relationship for the stratiform class was similar to the general one since the convective clouds did not developed and two classes of the rain rate were mixed.

• Journal of the Korean earth science society
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• v.33 no.2
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• pp.113-125
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• 2012

The estimations of the surface rain intensity and rain-related physical variables derived from two independent Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) satellite sensors, TRMM Microwave Imager (TMI) and Precipitation Radar (PR), were compared over four different oceans. The precipitating clouds developed most frequently in the warmest sea surface temperature (SST) region of the west Pacific, which is 1.5 times more frequent than in the east Pacific and the tropical Atlantic oceans. However, the east Pacific exhibited the most intense rain intensity for the convective and mixed rain types while the tropical Atlantic showed the most intense rain intensity for all TMI rainy pixels. It was found that the deviation of TMI-derived rain rate yielded a big difference in region-to-region and rain type-to-type if the PR rain intensity value is assumed to be closer to the truth. Furthermore, the deviation by rain types showed opposite signs between convective and non-convective rain types. It was found that the region-to-region deviation differences reached more than 200% even though the selected tropical oceans have relatively similar geophysical environments. Therefore, the validation for the microwave rain estimation needs to be performed according to both rain types and climate regimes, and it also requires more sophisticated TMI algorithm which reflects the locality of rainfall characteristics.

• Atmosphere
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• v.23 no.3
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• pp.265-273
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• 2013

To investigate properties of cloud and rainfall occurred at Boseong on 10 July 2012, Raindrop Size distributions (RSDs) and other parameters were analyzed using observation data collected by Micro Rain Radar (MRR) and PARticle SIze and VELocity (PARSIVEL) disdrometer located in the National center for intensive observation of severe weather at Boseong in the southwest of the Korean peninsula. In addition, time series of RSD parameters, relationship between reflectivity-rain rate, and vertical variation of rain rates-fall velocities below melting layer were examined. As a result, good agreements were found in the reflectivity-rain rate time series as well as their power relationships between MRR and PARSIVEL disdrometer. The rain rate was proportional to reflectivity, mean diameter, and inversely proportional to shape (${\mu}$), slope (${\Lambda}$), intercept ($N_0$) parameter of RSD. In comparison of the RSD, as rain rate was increased, the slope of RSD became less steep and the mean diameter became larger. Also, it was verified that reflectivities are classified in three categories (Category 1: Z (reflectivity) > 40 dBZ, Category 2: 30 dBZ < Z < 40 dBZ, Category 3: Z < 30 dBZ). As reflectivity was increased, rain rate was intensified and larger raindrops were existed, while reflectivity was decreased, shape (${\mu}$), slope (${\Lambda}$), intercept ($N_0$) parameter of RSD were increased. We expected that these results will lead to better understanding of microphysical process in convective rainfall system occurred during short-term period over Korean peninsula.