Identification

Title

Increasing water vapor in the stratosphere and mesosphere after 2002

Abstract

Water vapor (H2O) measurements made by the Sounding of the Atmosphere using Broadband Emission Radiometry (SABER) instrument between 2002 and 2018 and by the Aura Microwave Limb Sounder (MLS) instrument between 2004 and 2018 are analyzed to determine the linear trend and solar cycle response of H2O in the stratosphere and mesosphere. Both SABER and MLS show a rapid global H2O increase of 5-6% per decade in the lower stratosphere after the 2001 drop. The increasing zonal mean H2O at 40 degrees N in SABER and MLS is consistent with the Boulder frost point hygrometer data in the lower stratosphere. The global distribution of SABER and MLS H2O trends are positive at most altitudes and latitudes, and they peak in the tropical lower stratosphere. In the mesosphere the SABER H2O trend is 0.1-0.2 ppmv per decade and the MLS H2O trend is 0.2-0.3 ppmv per decade. The trend and solar cycle response derived from the observations are compared against the Whole Atmosphere Community Climate Model (WACCM). The solar cycle response of H2O from WACCM agrees with SABER and MLS. The linear H2O trend from WACCM does not show the observed increase in the lower stratosphere.

Resource type

document

Resource locator

Unique resource identifier

code

https://n2t.org/ark:/85065/d7n87f4m

codeSpace

Dataset language

eng

Spatial reference system

code identifying the spatial reference system

Classification of spatial data and services

Topic category

geoscientificInformation

Keywords

Keyword set

keyword value

Text

originating controlled vocabulary

title

Resource Type

reference date

date type

publication

effective date

2016-01-01T00:00:00Z

Geographic location

West bounding longitude

East bounding longitude

North bounding latitude

South bounding latitude

Temporal reference

Temporal extent

Begin position

End position

Dataset reference date

date type

publication

effective date

2019-11-28T00:00:00Z

Frequency of update

Quality and validity

Lineage

Conformity

Data format

name of format

version of format

Constraints related to access and use

Constraint set

Use constraints

Limitations on public access

None

Responsible organisations

Responsible party

contact position

OpenSky Support

organisation name

UCAR/NCAR - Library

full postal address

PO Box 3000

Boulder

80307-3000

email address

opensky@ucar.edu

web address

http://opensky.ucar.edu/

name: homepage

responsible party role

pointOfContact

Metadata on metadata

Metadata point of contact