Identification

Title

Tropospheric intrusions associated with the secondary tropopause

Abstract

Deep intrusions of tropospheric air into the lower stratosphere above the subtropical jet are investigated using new observations and meteorological analyses. These intrusions are characterized by low ozone concentration and low static stability. The low-ozone layer is consistently observed from ozonesonde profiles and satellite remote sensing data from Aura/HIRDLS. The intruding layer occurs along and under the poleward extending tropical tropopause, which becomes the secondary tropopause in middle to high latitudes. The association of the ozone and the thermal structure provides evidence for the physical significance of the subtropical tropopause break and the secondary tropopause. The core of the intruding layer is typically between 370 and 400 K potential temperature (∼15 km), but the vertical extent of the intrusion can impact ozone above 400 K, the lower boundary of the overworld. Two intrusion events over the continental United States in the spring of 2007 are analyzed to show the spatial extent and the temporal evolution of the intruding air mass. These examples demonstrate the effectiveness of potential temperature lapse rate, i.e., static stability, as a diagnostic for the intrusion event. Comparison with the potential vorticity field is made to show the complementarity of the two dynamical fields. The static stability diagnostic provides a tool to map out the horizontal extent of the intruding layer and to investigate its evolution. Furthermore, the diagnostic makes it possible to forecast the intrusion event for field studies.

Resource type

document

Resource locator

Unique resource identifier

code

http://n2t.net/ark:/85065/d7hm59hb

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

2009-05-20T00:00:00Z

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