• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.27 no.3
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• pp.213-220
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• 2010

As an observation instrument of the longest record of tropospheric water vapor, radiosonde data provide upper-air pressure (geopotential height), temperature, humidity and wind. However, the data have some well-known elements related to inaccuracy. In this article, radiosonde precipitable water vapor (PWV) at Sokcho observatory was compared with global positioning system (GPS) PWV during each summertime of year 2007 and 2008 and the biases were calculated. As a result, the mean bias showed negative values regardless of the rainfall occurrence. In addition, on the basis of GPS PWV, the maximum root mean square error (RMSE) was 5.67 mm over the radiosonde PWV.

• Journal of Positioning, Navigation, and Timing
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• v.4 no.2
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• pp.87-95
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• 2015

In this study, the temporal and spatial variation in precipitable water vapor (PWV) was analyzed for typhoon Ewiniar which had made landfall in the Korean peninsula in 2006. To make a contour map of PWV, zenith total delay (ZTD) was calculated using about 60 GPS permanent stations in Korea, and the pressure and temperature data of nearby AWS stations were interpolated and applied to the equation for calculating the PWV. While Typhoon Ewiniar was migrating north from the southern coast to the eastern coast of Korea, the PWV migrated showing a spatial distribution similar to that of rainfall. Also, the fluctuating pattern of the normalized PWV was analyzed, and the moving speed of the PWV was estimated using the delay time of the increase/decrease pattern in the eight-test stations. The result indicated that the moving speed of the PWV was about 35 km/h, which was similar to the average moving speed of the typhoon (38.9 km/h).

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.29 no.3
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• pp.295-303
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• 2012

In this study, we compared the precipitable water vapor (PWV) data derived from the radiosonde observation data at Sokcho Observatory and the PWV data at Sokcho Global Positioning System (GPS) Observatory provided by Korea Astronomy and Space Science Institute, for the years of 2006, 2008, 2010, and analyzed the radiosonde seasonal, diurnal bias according to radiosonde sensor types. In the scatter diagram of the daytime and nighttime radiosonde PWV data and the GPS PWV data, dry bias was found in the daytime radiosonde observation as known in the previous study. Overall, the tendency that the wet bias of the radiosonde PWV increased as the GPS PWV decreased and the dry bias of the radiosonde PWV increased as the GPS PWV increased. The quantitative analysis of the bias and error of the radiosonde PWV data showed that the mean bias decreased in the nighttime except for 2006 winter, and in comparison for summer, RS92-SGP sensor showed the highest quality.

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.27 no.3
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• pp.231-238
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• 2010

We analyzed global positioning system (GPS)-derived precipitable water vapor (PWV) trends of the Korea Astronomy and Space Science Institute 5 stations (Seoul, Daejeon, Mokpo, Milyang, Sokcho) where Korea Meteorological Administration meteorological data can be obtained at the same place. In the least squares analysis, the GPS PWV time series showed consistent positive trends (0.11 mm/year) over South Korea from 2000 to 2009. The annual increase of GPS PWV was comparable with the 0.17 mm/year and 0.02 mm/year from the National Center for Atmospheric Research Earth Observing Laboratory and Atmospheric InfraRed Sounder, respectively. For seasonal analysis, the increasing tendency was found by 0.05 mm/year, 0.16 mm/year, 0.04 mm/year in spring (March-May), summer (June-August) and winter (December-February), respectively. However, a negative trend (-0.14 mm/year) was seen in autumn (September-November). We examined the relationship between GPS PWV and temperature which is the one of the climatic elements. Two elements trends increased during the same period and the correlation coefficient was about 0.8. Also, we found the temperature rise has increased more GPS PWV and observed a stronger positive trend in summer than in winter. This is characterized by hot humid summer and cold dry winter of Korea climate and depending on the amount of water vapor the air contains at a certain temperature. In addition, it is assumed that GPS PWV positive trend is caused by increasing amount of saturated water vapor due to temperature rise in the Korean Peninsula. In the future, we plan to verify GPS PWV effectiveness as a tool to monitor changes in precipitable water through cause analysis of seasonal trends and indepth/long-term comparative analysis between GPS PWV and other climatic elements.

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.29 no.1
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• pp.1-10
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• 2012

In this study, global positioning system (GPS)-derived precipitable water vapor (PWV) and microwave radiometer (MWR)-measured integrated water vapor (IWV) were compared and their characteristics were analyzed. Comparing those two quantities for two years from August 2009, we found that GPS PWV estimates were larger than MWR IWV. The average difference over the entire test period was 1.1 mm and the standard deviation was 1.2 mm. When the discrepancies between GPS PWV and MWR IWV were analyzed depending on season, the average difference was 0.7 mm and 1.9 mm in the winter and summer months, respectively. Thus, the average difference was about 2.5 times larger in summer than that in winter. However, MWR IWV measurements in the winter months were over-estimated than those in the summer months as the water vapor content got larger. The results of the diurnal analysis showed that MWR IWV was underestimated in the daytime, showing a difference of 0.8 mm. In the early morning hours, MWR IWV has a tendency to be over-estimated, with a difference of 1.3 mm with respect to GPS PWV.

• Korean Journal of Remote Sensing
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• v.14 no.1
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• pp.53-68
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• 1998

Observation of hydrometeors' behavior in the atmosphere is important to understand weather and climate. By conventional observations, we can get the distribution of water vapor at limited number of points on the earth. In this study, the precipitable water has been estimated from the split window channel data on GMS-5 based upon the technique developed by Chesters et al.(1983). To retrieve the precipitable water, water vapor absorption parameter depending on filter function of sensor has been derived using the regression analysis between the split window channel data and the radiosonde data observed at Osan, Pohang, Kwangiu and Cheju staions for 4 months. The air temperature of 700 hPa from the Global Spectral Model of Korea Meteorological Administration (GSM/KMA) has been used as mean air temperature for single layer radiation model. The retrieved precipitable water for the period from August 1996 through December 1996 are compared to radiosonde data. It is shown that the root mean square differences between radiosonde observations and the GMS-5 retrievals range from 0.65 g/$cm^2$ to 1.09 g/$cm^2$ with correlation coefficient of 0.46 on hourly basis. The monthly distribution of precipitable water from GMS-5 shows almost good representation in large scale. Precipitable water is produced 4 times a day at Korea Meteorological Administration in the form of grid point data with 0.5 degree lat./lon. resolution. The data can be used in the objective analysis for numerical weather prediction and to increase the accuracy of humidity analysis especially under clear sky condition. And also, the data is a useful complement to existing data set for climatological research. But it is necessary to get higher correlation between radiosonde observations and the GMS-5 retrievals for operational applications.

• Atmosphere
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• v.17 no.3
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• pp.291-298
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• 2007

The precipitable water vapors (PWVs) obtained from Global Positioning System (GPS) and Microwave Radiometer (MWR) measurements have been compared for validation of precision of the GPS PWV at Daegwallyoung station for 21 days from Sep. 30 to Oct. 20, 2006. The GPS PWV is estimated using the delay of GPS signals due to the water vapor in the atmosphere with a local mean temperature equation, called HP model, and the MWR PWV by the combinational radiance observation of two channels (23.8 and 31.4 GHz). During the co-observation period, the MWR and GPS PWV show a similar trend, and the bias between the PWVs is 1.7 mm on average. When the bias is removed, the PWV of GPS gives good agreement with that of MWR, having about 1 mm for both the standard deviation and RMS error between the GPS and MWR PWV.

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.27 no.4
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• pp.367-375
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• 2010

In this study, we compared the precipitable water vapor (PWV) data derived from the radiosonde observation data at Sokcho Observatory and the PWV data at Sokcho Global Positioning System (GPS) Observatory provided by Korea Astronomy and Space Science Institute, from 0000 UTC, June 1, 2007 to 1200 UTC, May 31, 2009, and analyzed the radiosonde bias between the day and the night. In the scatter diagram of the daytime and nighttime radiosonde PWV data and the GPS PWV data, dry bias was found in the daytime radiosonde observation as known in the previous study. In addition, for all the rainfall events, the tendency that the wet bias of the radiosonde PWV increased as the GPS PWV decreased and the dry bias of the radiosonde PWV increased as the GPS PWV increased was significantly less distinctive in nighttime than in daytime. The quantitative analysis of the bias and error of the radiosonde PWV data showed that the mean bias decreased in the second year, regardless of nighttime or daytime rainfall, and the non-rainfall root mean square error (RMSE) was similar to that of the previous studies, while the rainfall RMSE was larger to a certain extent.

• Atmosphere
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• v.20 no.1
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• pp.1-12
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• 2010

Temporal distributions and characteristics of PWV (Precipitable Water Vapor) and LWP (Liquid Water Path) are investigated by using the microwave radiometric profiler at Haenam NCIO from 1 August 2007 to 31 July 2008. Temporal variations of PWV are closely connected with the thermal response of water vapor in atmosphere. The variations of LWP are characterized by the rainfall variation being basically attributable to the heavy rain-bearing clouds. The frequency distributions of PWV and LWP according to the four sky conditions ('clear', 'lightly cloudy', 'cloudy', and 'deeply cloudy') by total cloud amount at Wando Observatory corresponds with a change of slope in cumulative distribution function for PWV and LWP. There results implies that the classification of sky condition can be applied by using the distribution of PWV and LWP from microwave radiometric profiler.

• Proceedings of the Korea Water Resources Association Conference
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• 2003.05a
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• pp.163-170
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• 2003

In this study, paying much attention to notable features obtained from spatial distributions of strongly related indices (precipitable water, convergence of air, convective available potential energy) with precipitation, fatal problems in selecting strongly related indices with observed precipitation in a BAIU season were discussed. These results showed spatial distribution of a predicted index provided alternative and physically consistent interpretation for selecting dominant index for heavy rainfall even if the predicted index did not correlate with observed rainfall at a specific observational point as confirmed by the features of CONV (Convergence) or even if it correlated with observed rainfall as confirmed by those of PW (Precipitable Water). Therefore, dominant meteorological indices of heavy rainfall should be selected according to physically evidenced interpretation on features of spatial distributions of indices, and physically and statistically consistent relationship should be built up.