Characterization of the long-term radiosonde temperature biases in the upper troposphere and lower stratosphere using COSMIC and Metop-A/GRAS data from 2006 to 2014

Radiosonde observations (RAOBs) have provided the only long-term global in situ temperature measurements in the troposphere and lower stratosphere since 1958. In this study, we use consistently reprocessed Global Positioning System (GPS) radio occultation (RO) temperature data derived from the COSMIC and Metop-A/GRAS missions from 2006 to 2014 to characterize the inter-seasonal and interannual variability of temperature biases in the upper troposphere and lower stratosphere for different radiosonde sensor types. The results show that the temperature biases for different sensor types are mainly due to (i) uncorrected solar-zenith-angle-dependent errors and (ii) change of radiation correction. The mean radiosonde–RO global daytime temperature difference in the layer from 200 to 20 hPa for Vaisala RS92 is equal to 0.20 K. The corresponding difference is equal to −0.06 K for Sippican, 0.71 K for VIZ-B2, 0.66 K for Russian AVK-MRZ, and 0.18 K for Shanghai. The global daytime trend of differences for Vaisala RS92 and RO temperature at 50 hPa is equal to 0.07 K/5 yr. Although there still exist uncertainties for Vaisala RS92 temperature measurement over different geographical locations, the global trend of temperature differences between Vaisala RS92 and RO from June 2006 to April 2014 is within ±0.09 K/5

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Copyright Author(s) 2017. This work is distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License


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Author Ho, Shu-peng
Peng, Liang
Vömel, Holger
Publisher UCAR/NCAR - Library
Publication Date 2017-04-04T00:00:00
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Topic Category geoscientificInformation
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Metadata Date 2023-08-18T19:10:11.724735
Metadata Record Identifier edu.ucar.opensky::articles:19594
Metadata Language eng; USA
Suggested Citation Ho, Shu-peng, Peng, Liang, Vömel, Holger. (2017). Characterization of the long-term radiosonde temperature biases in the upper troposphere and lower stratosphere using COSMIC and Metop-A/GRAS data from 2006 to 2014. UCAR/NCAR - Library. http://n2t.net/ark:/85065/d7fx7c88. Accessed 15 February 2025.

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