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The sudden decrease in stratospheric water vapor at around the year 2000 to 2001 is relatively well accepted in spite of the difficulty to quantify the long-term variations. This stepwise change is studied by examining the entry value of water to the stratosphere ([H2O](e)) and some Lagrangian diagnostics of dehydration taking place in the tropical tropopause layer (TTL). The analysis is made using the backward kinematic trajectories initialized every similar to 10 days from January 1997 to December 2002 at 400 K potential temperature surface in the tropics. The [H2O](e) is estimated by the ensemble mean value of the water saturation mixing ratio (SMR) at the Lagrangian cold point (LCP) where SMR becomes minimum (SMRmin) in the TTL before reaching the 400 K surface. The drop in [H2O](e) is identified to have occurred in September 2000. The horizontal projection of September trajectories, tightly trapped by anticyclonic circulation around the Tibetan high, shows eastward expansion since the year 2000. Associated changes are measured by three-dimensional bins, each having the dimension of 10 degrees longitude by 10 degrees latitude within the TTL. The probability distribution of LCPs shows an appreciable change exhibiting a composite pattern of two components: (i) the dipole structure consisting of the decrease over the Bay of Bengal and Malay Peninsula and the increase over the northern subtropical western Pacific and (ii) the patterns of the decrease over the equatorial western Pacific and the increase over the central Pacific that are almost symmetric with respect to the Equator. The SMRmin shows a general decrease in the tropics with some enhancement in the central Pacific. The expectation values, defined by the multiple of the probability of LCP events and the ensemble mean values of SMRmin, are calculated on each bin for both periods prior and posterior to the drop. These values are the spatial projection of [H2O](e) on an individual bin. The results indicate th

In submitting data to the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) World Ozone and Ultraviolet Data Center (WOUDC), numerous ozonesonde stations include a correction factor (CF) that multiplies ozone concentration profile data so that the columns computed agree with column measurements from co-located groundbased and/or overpassing satellite instruments. We evaluate this practice through an examination of data from four Japanese ozonesonde stations: Kagoshima, Naha, Sapporo, and Tsukuba. While agreement between the sonde columns and Total Ozone Mapping Spectrometer (TOMS) or Ozone Mapping Instrument (OMI) is improved by use of the CF, agreement between the sonde ozone concentrations reported near the surface and data from surface monitors near the launch sites is negatively impacted. In addition, we find the agreement between the mean sonde columns without the CF and the ground-based Dobson instrument columns is improved by 1.5% by using the McPeters et al. (1997) balloon burst climatology rather than the constant mixing ratio assumption (that has been used for the data in the WOUDC archive) for the above burst height column estimate. Limited comparisons of coincident ozonesonde profiles from Hokkaido University with those in the WOUDC database suggest that while the application of the CFs in the stratosphere improves agreement, it negatively impacts the agreement in the troposphere. Finally and importantly, unexplained trends and changing trends in the CFs appear over the last 20 years. The overall trend in the reported CFs for the four Japanese ozonesonde stations from 1990–2010 is (−0.264±0.036)×10−2 yr−1; but from 1993–1999 the trend is (−2.18±0.14)×10−2 yr−1 and from 1999–2009 is (1.089±0.075)×10−2 yr−1, resulting in a statistically significant difference in CF trends between these two periods of (3.26±0.16)×10−2 yr−1. Repeating the analysis using CFs derived from columns computed using the balloon-burst climatology, the trends are somewhat reduced, but remain s

Cloud-top height (CTH) variability in the tropical tropopause layer (TTL) in association with equatorial Kelvin waves is investigated using a new CTH dataset based on MTSAT-1R geostationary satellite measurements with a statistical look-up table constructed based on CloudSat measurements. We focus on a case in the tropical Indian Ocean during October-December 2006, when shipboard radiosonde, TTL water vapor, and 95-GHz cloud radar measurements were taken during the Mirai Indian Ocean cruise for the Study of the MJO-convection Onset (MISMO) field campaign. At 10-15 km, the satellite-based CTH data agree well with the radar echo top heights from shipboard radar reflectivity data. During the MISMO campaign, cloud frequency was suppressed in the warm phase of equatorial Kelvin waves propagating in the TTL. The suppressed-cloud region moves eastward to the western Pacific together with Kelvin waves. We found that changes in CTH occurrence frequency over the vessel in association with Kelvin waves are much greater than those associated with the diurnal cycle. It is expected that the phase of equatorial Kelvin waves is important for the intraseasonal variabilities of both the radiative budget of the tropical atmosphere and water vapor transport in the TTL.

A method of correction for radiosonde pressure and temperature data by using simultaneous global positioning system (GPS) ellipsoidal height (zGPS) is proposed. The correction is made by adjusting the observed pressure and temperature so that the ellipsoidal height (zPTU) calculated from integrating the hypsometric equation by using the latitude- and altitude-dependent gravity together with the observed pressure, temperature and humidity (PTU) agrees with zGPS. The temperature bias is assumed to arise only from inaccurate radiation correction so that there is no temperature bias in the nighttime data. Under this assumption, the deviations of zPTU from zGPS in the nighttime data result only from observational errors in pressure. The pressure adjustment required to remove these deviations is applied also to the daytime data. The daytime temperature bias can then be estimated from the difference between zPTU and zGPS during the day. The biases in Vaisala RS80 pressure and temperature measurements are estimated using the Soundings of Ozone and Water in the Equatorial Region campaign data. The estimated pressure bias is positive below ∼7 km and negative above it. The bias above 15 km is statistically significant. The daytime temperature bias lacks statistical significance due to fluctuations in the results.

Ozone and water vapor observations have been conducted at Christmas/Kiritimati Island (2 degrees N, 157 degrees W) in the equatorial central Pacific as a part of the Soundings of Ozone and Water in the Equatorial Region (SOWER)/Pacific mission. We launched 33 ozonesondes and 33 chilled-mirror hygrometers in nine observation campaigns from 1999 to 2003 for various seasons. We found that ozone concentrations at Christmas Island are low in the whole troposphere (similar to 10-35 ppbv), particularly in the marine boundary layer (MBL). Ozone variation is small throughout the year compared with other tropical stations, though annual and interannual variations of meteorological fields are large over the equatorial central Pacific. Just below the tropopause, during the August 2002 campaign, we observed substantially reduced ozone concentrations (<10 ppbv) similar to those found in the MBL, which are maintained at least for the observation period. From meteorological conditions, we found that air mass was advected from the Inter-Tropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ), located to the north of Christmas Island, in accordance with the northeasterly wind that is only observed during northern summer in the upper troposphere. The origin of air mass is supposed to be from the MBL in the ITCZ.

Water vapor observations by chilled-mirror hygrometers were conducted at Bandung, Indonesia (6.90° S, 107.60° E) and Tarawa, Kiribati (1.35° N, 172.91° E) in December 2003 to examine the efficiency of dehydration during horizontal advection in the tropical tropopause layer (TTL). Trajectory analyses based on bundles of isentropic trajectories suggest that the modification of air parcels' identity due to irreversible mixing by the branching-out and merging-in of nearby trajectories is found to be an important factor, in addition to the routes air parcels follow, for interpreting the water vapor concentrations observed by chilled-mirror frostpoint hygrometers in the TTL. Clear correspondence between the observed water vapor concentration and the estimated temperature history of air parcels is found showing that drier air parcels were exposed to lower temperatures than were more humid ones during advection. Although the number of observations is quite limited, the water content in the observed air parcels on many occasions was more than that expected from the minimum saturation mixing ratio during horizontal advection prior to sonde observations.

The ‘‘Snow White’’ hygrometer is a low-cost, chilled-mirror hygrometer for radiosonde applications provided by a Swiss company, Meteolabor AG. A total of 54 Snow White soundings were conducted at five tropical stations in different seasons in 2000–01. All soundings were made with Vaisala RS80 radiosondes equipped either with the A-Humicap (22 soundings) or H-Humicap (32) relative humidity (RH) sensor. Comparisons of the RH with respect to liquid water between the Snow White and the different RS80 Humicap sensors are made. The Snow White measurements show reasonable agreement with the H-Humicap measurements from the surface up to ;12 km (above 2508C air temperature), the region where the H-Humicap sensor can be considered reliable. Above 12 km, the H-Humicap sensor tends to miss small vertical-scale structures in RH due to the time lag error, but on average both instruments show no significant difference up to 14 km (2658C). The comparison between the Snow White and A-Humicap sensors shows the known A-Humicap dry bias error at low temperatures and second dry bias error in the wet lower troposphere. The latter error [(A-Humicap RH) . 0.9 3 (Snow White RH) above 50% RH] may be a common problem for the recent A-Humicap sensors. These intercomparisons confirm the validity of the Snow White measurements at least up to the tropical upper troposphere and above 3%–6% RH.

The Snow White hygrometer, made by Meteolabor AG, Switzerland, is a new chilled-mirror instrument using a thermoelectric Peltier cooler to measure atmospheric water vapor. Its performance under dry conditions is evaluated in simultaneous measurements using the NOAA/CMDL frost-point hygrometer at Boulder, Colorado; San Cristo´bal, Gala´pagos Islands, Ecuador; Watukosek, Indonesia; and Mauna Loa Observatory, Hawaii. The Snow White exhibits a lower detection limit of about 3%–6% relative humidity, depending on the sensor configuration. This detection limit is determined by the temperature depression attainable by the thermoelectric cooler. In some cases, loss of frost-point control within layers with relative humidity below this detection limit caused inaccurate measurements above these dry layers, where the relative humidity was within the detection range of the instrument. The sensor does not operate in the stratosphere because of the large frost-point depression and the large potential for outgassing of water from the instrument box and the sensor housing. The instrument has some capabilities in the tropical tropopause region; however, the results are somewhat mixed.