1. Quantification of structural uncertainty in climate data records from GPS radio occultation
- Author
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Steiner, A., Hunt, D., Ho, S., Kirchengast, G., Mannucci, A., Scherllin-Pirscher, B., Gleisner, H., v. Engeln, A., Schmidt, T., Ao, C., Leroy, S., Kursinski, E., Foelsche, U., Gorbunov, M., Heise, S., Kuo, Y., Lauritsen, K., Marquardt, C., Rocken, C., Schreiner, W., Sokolovskiy, S., Syndergaard, S., and Wickert, J.
- Subjects
lcsh:Chemistry ,lcsh:QD1-999 ,010504 meteorology & atmospheric sciences ,13. Climate action ,0202 electrical engineering, electronic engineering, information engineering ,550 - Earth sciences ,020206 networking & telecommunications ,02 engineering and technology ,01 natural sciences ,lcsh:Physics ,lcsh:QC1-999 ,0105 earth and related environmental sciences - Abstract
Global Positioning System (GPS) radio occultation (RO) provides continuous observations of the Earth's atmosphere since 2001 with global coverage, all-weather capability, and high accuracy and vertical resolution in the upper troposphere and lower stratosphere (UTLS). Precise time measurements enable long-term stability but careful processing is needed. Here we provide climate-oriented atmospheric scientists with multicenter-based results on the long-term stability of RO climatological fields for trend studies. We quantify the structural uncertainty of atmospheric trends estimated from the RO record, which arises from current processing schemes of six international RO processing centers, DMI Copenhagen, EUM Darmstadt, GFZ Potsdam, JPL Pasadena, UCAR Boulder, and WEGC Graz. Monthly-mean zonal-mean fields of bending angle, refractivity, dry pressure, dry geopotential height, and dry temperature from the CHAMP mission are compared for September 2001 to September 2008. We find that structural uncertainty is lowest in the tropics and mid-latitudes (50° S to 50° N) from 8 km to 25 km for all inspected RO variables. In this region, the structural uncertainty in trends over 7 yr is
- Published
- 2012
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