In this study, CLEX researchers used aircraft observations from twenty flights during three Austral winters to study the microphysical and reflective properties of shallow convective clouds over the mid-latitude Southern Ocean.
CLEX researchers have constructed the oldest daily historical climate dataset for Perth, southwestern Australia, to provide an extended record for analysing pre‐industrial climate variability and extremes for the region.
A major component of the research in the Drought program over the past four months has focused on the interface between real-world data and climate models. The aim of much of this research has been to improve how land surface models represent some of the key processes that influence the length, and severity of drought.
This paper details a new approach to evaluating the performance of land surface models, the component of climate and weather models that simulates land surface processes. It focuses on the cycle of solar radiation during daylight hours and how the energy from the sun is exchanged between the land surface and lower atmosphere.
An international group of researchers performed a critical review of the information infrastructure that connects ecosystem modelling and measurement efforts. This group has now proposed a roadmap to community cyber-infrastructure development that can reduce the divisions between empirical research and modelling, accelerating the pace of discovery.
CLEX researchers examined the uncertainties of the input data of three commonly used drought indices, with the data coming from different sources, including observations and reanalysis. The ability of these indices to detect drought was assessed against soil moisture from multiple global land surface models.
From November 13-December 17, 2019, Sonny Truong took part in an observational voyage aboard the RV Investigator 30kms off the coast of Darwin. It was a voyage that featured some firsts for this atmospheric scientists and resulted in some great research and a spectacular time-lapse video of a storm forming and dissipating out to sea.
The drought may have finally eased over much of Australia, but it has resulted in a range of research that still continues. This research has opened new insights into how we understand the lifecycle of droughts in Australia. At the same time, continuing analyses of Australian models has produced improved configurations and even led to a new modelling framework for urban centres.
Focusing on the land regions around the world, the researchers assessed the representation of annual maximum of daily precipitation (Rx1day) across 22 observational products gridded at 1°x1° resolution.
To better understand the biases and ultimately improve the quality of our climate records, CLEX researches and their collaborators undertook in situ measurements using the NOAA Physical Sciences Division flux system during the Clouds, Aerosols, Precipitation, Radiation, and Atmospheric Composition over the Southern Ocean (CAPRICORN) experiment in 2016.