THE PROPOSED RESEARCH IS DIRECTED TOWARD THE DEVELOPMENT OF HIGH-QUALITY LARGE-SCALE FORCING DATA FOR USE IN CLOUD SYSTEM RESOLVING MODELS (CSRMS) AND SINGLE-COLUMN MODELS (SCMS) BASED ON DATA COLLECTED DURING THE MIDLATITUDE CONTINENTAL CONVECTIVE CLOUDS EXPERIMENT (MC3E) CONDUCTED OVER THE SOUTHERN GREAT PLAINS IN APRIL-JUNE 2011. OUR RESEARCH GROUP PARTICIPATED IN MC3E BY PROVIDING THE CSU DEPARTMENT OF ATMOSPHERIC SCIENCE VAISALA SOUNDING SYSTEM AND STAFFING FOR LAUNCH OPERATIONS AT PRATT KS AT THE NORTHWESTERN CORNER OF THE MC3E SOUNDING ARRAY. A SECOND ASPECT OF THE PROPOSED RESEARCH IS TO SYSTEMATICALLY COMPARE AND CONTRAST HEATING PROFILES OBTAINED FROM PMM AND OTHER FIELD CAMPAIGNS DURING RECENT DECADES OVER BOTH LAND AND OCEAN WITH THE GOAL OF IMPROVING PMM LATENT HEATING ALGORITHM DEVELOPMENT OVER THESE STARKLY CONTRASTING SURFACES. FINALLY WE PROPOSE TO FURTHER CONTRIBUTE TO THE IMPROVEMENT OF LATENT HEATING ALGORITHMS BY EVALUATING THE IMPACT OF HYDROMETEOR STORAGE ON DIAGNOSED HEATING PROFILES ON TIME SCALES RANGING FROM DIURNAL TO INTRASEASONAL USING DATA FROM MC3E AS WELL AS THE RECENT EXPERIMENT DYNAMO (DYNAMICS OF THE MJO) CONDUCTED IN THE INDIAN OCEAN (OCTOBER 2011