Transcript 100216Nowhere_ASRInfoSlide_YuanHouze.ppt

Mesoscale Convective System Anvil Clouds—Jian Yuan & Robert Houze
1. The upper panel of last slide is the
annual distribution of active MCS
(number/(disc with 5 degree radii))
2. The middle panel of last slide is annual
mean coverage of active MCS anvil
clouds (computed for each 5x5 degree
box; the unit is %)
3. The bottom panel shows contour plot
of the pressure and latitude crosssection of annual mean radiative
heating solely due to active MCS anvil
clouds for the 10 S -10 N tropical band.
The unit is K/day.
The Net heating profile used is adapted
from Figure 9 of Webster and Stephens
1980. Anvil cloud fraction presented in the
middle panel is used to roughly estimate
the annual mean radiative heating.