Dynamical Effects of Water Vapor and on Storm Tracks and their Response to Climate Change

California Institute Of Technology, Pasadena CA

Investigators

Abstract

Storm tracks are an important component of the general circulation and have significant impacts on weather and climate, both at regional and global scales. This project uses an hierarchy of models to study the dynamical impacts of water vapor on storm tracks. Most studies of storm track dynamics have made use of either dry dynamical models which ignored the impact of water vapor, or comprehensive general circulation models (GCM) that include all relevant physics but are expensive to run. In this project, a GCM that incorporates some of the interactions between water vapor and dynamics will be used. The advantage of using simplified physics compared to comprehensive GCMs, is that it will enable extensive experimentation of parameter space. Storms have crucial impacts on society and improved understanding of such phenomenon has significant broader impacts.