Background error covariance (BEC) is one of the key components in the data assimilation systems for numerical weather prediction. Recently, a scheme of using an inhomogeneous and anisotropic BEC estimated from historical forecast error samples has been tested by employing the extended alpha control variable approach (BEC-CVA) in the framework of the Variational Data Assimilation system for the Weather Research and Forecasting model (WRFDA). In this paper, the BEC-CVA approach is further examined by conducting single observation assimilation experiments and continuously cycling data assimilation and forecasting experiments covering a 3-weeks period. Moreover, additional benefits of using a blending approach (BEC-BLD), which combines a static, homogeneous BEC with an inhomogeneous and anisotropic BEC, are also assessed.

 Single observation experiments indicate that the noises in the increments in BEC-CVA can be somehow reduced by using BEC-BLD, while the inhomogeneous and multivariable correlations from the BEC-CVA are still taken into account. The impact of BEC-CVA and BEC-BLD on short-term weather forecasts is compared with three-dimensional variational data assimilation scheme (3DVar), and compared with the hybrid ensemble transform Kalman filter and 3DVar (ETKF-3DVar) in WRFDA also. Results show that the BEC-CVA and BEC-BLD outperform the use of 3DVar. It is shown that BEC-CVA and BEC-BLD underperform ETKF-3DVar as expected, however the computational cost of BEC-CVA and BEC-BLD is considerably less expensive since no ensemble forecasts are required.

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 Climate variability in monsoon and arid regions attributable to dynamic vegetation is investigated by using NCAR’s Community Earth System Model (CESM) with the Dynamic Global Vegetation Model. Two present climate simulations, one with dynamic and the other with fixed vegetation cover, are carried out. A comparative analysis of the two simulations reveals that climate in monsoon and arid regions show different responses to the dynamic vegetation. On hemispheric scale, precipitation mainly exhibits increase in the Northern Hemisphere and decrease in the Southern Hemisphere in response to dynamic vegetation, and the surface temperature shows consistent decrease. On regional scale, the precipitation decrease caused by dynamic vegetation is the main trend in the monsoon regions except the Asian monsoon region, whereas the responses of precipitation to vegetation change is weak in the arid regions relative to monsoon regions. The surface temperature increased significantly due to dynamic vegetation only in the boreal winter Asian monsoon region, whereas the rest of monsoon regions and the arid regions mainly shows decreased surface temperature. Therefore, climate variability in the Asian monsoon region is obviously different from other regions. Further analysis shows that the dynamic vegetation can modulate the variations of the east-west sea level pressure gradient and the lower-level meridional winds in East Asia, and strengthen (weaken) East Asian summer (winter) monsoon. Mechanistic analysis reveals that the difference in hemispheric and regional climate variations may be due to the changes of dynamic vegetation-induced moisture flux and net surface radiative forcing. View full abstract

 This study investigated the absolute values of column-integrated water vapor (precipitable water; PW) in the climate models used in the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 5 (CMIP5), in terms of the relationships between PW and precipitation characteristics. We identified that global mean PW values are systematically much lower in CMIP5 models than in observations. This dry bias is most profound over the tropical ocean. The dry bias is partly due to biases in sea surface temperatures in the CMIP5-coupled climate models. However, the dry bias is also present in Atmospheric Model Intercomparison Project (AMIP) experiments, which implies the existence of other factors. The relationship between PW and rainfall characteristics shows that rainfall occurs when water vapor levels are lower than in observations, particularly in models with a relatively strong dry bias. This suggests that the reproducibility of rainfall characteristics may be associated with the dry bias. View full abstract

 The response of tropical cyclone (TC) activity to the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and coherent sea surface temperate (SST) anomaly in the Indian Ocean (IO) is investigated with a particular focus on the decaying phase of El Niño. The TC anomalies are obtained from the database for Policy Decision making for Future climate change (d4PDF). This dataset is based on 100-member ensemble simulations for the period of 1951-2010 by use of the state-of-the-art atmospheric general circulation model (AGCM) forced with observed SST as well as the historical radiative forcing. AGCM utilized in the d4PDF is the Meteorological Research Institute Atmospheric General Circulation Model with about 60km horizontal resolution. Our analysis reveals a prolonged decrease in TC frequency over the tropical western Pacific during the post El Niño years until the boreal fall. Dominance of anomalous anticyclone (AAC) over the western Pacific induced by the delayed warming in the tropical Indian Ocean is the main factor for the suppressed TC activity rather than the local SST change. In contrast, the TC number over the South China Sea tends to increase during the post-El Niño fall (September to November). The physical reason can be ascribed to the weakening of AAC associated with the termination of IO warming. Thus we demonstrate that the effect of the IO warming should be taken into account when the ENSO is considered as an environmental factor for predicting TC activity. View full abstract

 This paper presents a summary of some of the observational and numerical studies on the climatology and possible change mechanisms of the outer-core wind structure of a tropical cyclone (TC), which has been generally referred to as size, a term also to be used in this review although various definitions have been given in the literature. In all the ocean basins where TCs exist, TC size has been found to vary with season, year, decade, latitude and longitude. Such variations are related to those in the synoptic flow patterns in which the TCs are embedded. Several factors have been identified to be responsible for changes in TC size, which include environmental humidity, vortex structure, sea surface temperature and planetary vorticity. Each of these factors can modify the transport of lower tropospheric angular momentum into the TC and hence cause changes in its size. The paper ends with a discussion of outstanding issues in the study of the outer-core wind structure of a TC. View full abstract

 This study used the JRA-55 reanalysis dataset to analyze the structure and environment of extratropical cyclones (ECs) that spawned tornadoes (tornadic ECs: TECs) between 1961 and 2011 in Japan. Composite analysis indicated that the differences between the structure and environment of TECs and those of ECs that did not spawn tornadoes (non-tornadic ECs: NTECs) vary with the seasons. In spring (March–May), TECs are associated with stronger upper-level potential vorticity and colder mid-level temperature than NTECs. The colder air at the mid-level contributes to the increase in convective available potential energy (CAPE) of TECs. TECs in winter (December–February: DJF) and those northward of 40°N in autumn (September–November: SON) are accompanied by larger CAPE than are NTECs. The larger CAPE for TECs in DJF is caused by larger moisture and warmer temperature at low levels, and that for TECs northward of 40°N in SON (NSON) is caused by the colder mid-level temperature associated with an upper-level trough. The distribution of the energy helicity index also shows significant differences between TECs and NTECs for DJF and NSON. On the other hand, the distribution of the 0–1 km storm relative environmental helicity (SREH) shows no significant differences between TECs and NTECs in most seasons except DJF. A comparison of TECs between Japan and the United States (US) shows that SREH and CAPE are noticeably larger in the US. It is suggested that these differences occur because TECs in the US (Japan) develop over land (ocean), which exerts more (less) surface friction and diurnal heating. View full abstract

 We develop a common retrieval algorithm of aerosol properties such as aerosol optical thickness, single-scattering albedo, and Ångström exponent for various satellite sensors over both land and ocean. The three main features of this algorithm are as follows: (1) automatic selection of the optimum channels for aerosol retrieval by introducing a weight for each channel to the object function, (2) setting common candidate aerosol models over land and ocean, and (3) preparation of lookup tables for every 1 nm in the range from 300 to 2500 nm of wavelength and weighting the radiance using the response function for each sensor. This method was applied to the Advanced Himawari Imager (AHI) on board the Japan Meteorological Agency’s geostationary satellite Himawari-8, and the results depicted an approximately continuous estimate of aerosol optical thickness over land and ocean. Further, the aerosol optical thickness estimated using our algorithm was generally consistent with the products from Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) and Aerosol Robotic Network (AERONET). Additionally, we applied our algorithm to MODIS on board the Aqua satellite and then compared the retrieval results to those that were obtained using AHI. The comparisons of the aerosol optical thickness retrieved from different sensors with different viewing angles on board the geostationary and polar-orbiting satellites suggest an underestimation of aerosol optical thickness at the backscattering direction (or overestimated in other directions). The retrieval of aerosol properties using a common algorithm allows us to identify a weakness in the algorithm, which includes the assumptions in the aerosol model (e.g. sphericity or size distiribution). View full abstract

 Continuous observations of cloud droplet size distributions (DSDs) in low-level stratiform clouds have been conducted at a height of 458 m from Tokyo Skytree (a 634-m high broadcasting tower in Tokyo) using a cloud droplet spectrometer. In this report, the characteristics of cloud parameters related to the cloud DSD from June to December 2016 are presented. The mean cloud droplet number concentration (N_c), average diameters, and effective diameters of cloud droplets in non-drizzling clouds were 213 cm^-3, 7.3 μm, and 9.5 μm, respectively, which are close to the reported values for continental stratiform clouds. The relationship between the liquid water content (LWC; g m^-3), N_c (cm^-3) and radar reflectivity (Z; mm⁶ m^-3) was estimated as LWC = 0.17N_c^0.50 Z^0.45, with a coefficient of determination ( R ²) of 0.93. The observed cloud DSDs were well fitted by a lognormal distribution and the average median diameter of the fitted DSD was 6.6 μm. View full abstract

 Convective initiation (CI) nowcasting often has a low probability of detection (POD) and a high false-alarm ratio (FAR) at sub-tropical regions where the warm-rain processes often occur. Using the high spatial- and temporal-resolution and multi-spectral data from the Advanced Himawari Imager (AHI) on board Japanese new-generation geostationary satellite Himawari-8, a stand-alone CI nowcasting algorithm is developed in this study. The AHI-based CI algorithm utilizes the reflectance observations from channels 1 (0.47 μm) and 7 (3.9 μm), brightness temperature observations from infrared window channel 13 (10.4 μm), the dual-spectral differences between channels 10 (7.3 μm) and 13, 13 and 15 (12.4 μm), as well as a tri-spectral combination of channels 11, 15 and 13, as CI predictors without relying on any dynamic ancillary data (e.g., cloud type and atmospheric motion vector products). The proposed AHI-based algorithm is applied to CI cases over Fujian province in the Southeastern China. When validated by S-band radar observations, the CI algorithm produced a POD as high as 93.33 %, and a FAR as low as 33.33 % for a CI case day that occurred on 1 August 2015 over Northern Fujian. For over 216 CI events that occurred in a three-month period from July to September 2015, the CI nowcasting lead time has a mean value of ~64 minutes, with a longest lead time over 120 minutes. It is suggested that false-alarm nowcasts that occur in the presence of capping inversion require further investigation and algorithm enhancements. View full abstract

 The present study implements long-term surface observed radiation data (pyranometer observed global flux and sky radiometer observed spectral zenith transmittance data) of multiple SKYNET sites to validate water cloud optical properties (cloud optical depth COD and effective radius Re) observed from space by MODIS onboard TERRA and AQUA satellites and AHI onboard Himawari-8 satellite. Despite some degrees of differences in COD and Re between MODIS and AHI, they both showed common features when validated using surface based global flux data as well as cloud properties retrieved from sky radiometer observed zenith transmittance data. In general, CODs from both satellite sensors are found to overestimated when clouds are optically thin. Among a number of factors (spatial and temporal variations of cloud, sensor and solar zenith angles), the solar zenith angle (SZA) is found to have an impact on COD difference between reflectance based satellite sensor and transmittance based sky radiometer. The Re values from the sky radiometer and satellite sensor are generally poorly correlated. The difference in Re between the sky radiometer and satellite sensor is negatively correlated with COD difference between them, which is likely due to the inherent influence of Re retrieval precision on COD retrieval and vice versa in transmittance based sky radiometer. View full abstract

 The Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) launched a next-generation geostationary meteorological satellite (GMS), Himawari-8, on October 7, 2014 and began its operation on July 7, 2015. The Advanced Himawari Imager (AHI) onboard Himawari-8 has 16 observational bands that enable the retrieval of full-disk maps of aerosol optical properties (AOPs), including aerosol optical thickness (AOT) and the Ångström exponent (AE) with unprecedented spatial and temporal resolution. In this study, we combined an aerosol transport model with the Himawari-8 AOT using the data assimilation method, and performed aerosol assimilation and forecasting experiments on smoke from an intensive wildfire that occurred over Siberia between May 15 and 18, 2016. To effectively utilize the high observational frequency of Himawari-8, we assimilated 1-h merged AOTs generated through the combination of six AOT snapshots taken over 10-min intervals, three times per day. The heavy smoke originating from the wildfire was transported eastward behind a low-pressure trough, and covered northern Japan from May 19 to 20. The southern part of the smoke plume then traveled westward, in a clockwise flow associated with high pressure. The forecast without assimilation reproduced the transport of the smoke to northern Japan; however, it underestimated AOT and the extinction coefficient compared with observed values, mainly due to errors in the emission inventory. Data assimilation with the Himawari-8 AOT compensated for the underestimation and successfully forecasted the unique C-shaped distribution of the smoke. In particular, the assimilation of the Himawari-8 AOT during May 18 greatly improved the forecast of the southern part of the smoke flow. Our results indicate that the inheritance of assimilation cycles and the assimilation of more recent observations led to better forecasting in this case of a continental smoke outflow. View full abstract

 The proposed study aims to examine the relation between the Tibetan Plateau (TP) thermal condition and El Niño and Southern Oscillation (ENSO). There were significantly positive correlations between the snow water equivalent (SWE) over the TP from November to next April and sea surface temperature (SST) in the Eastern Equatorial Pacific (EEP) in Novmber from 1987 to 2005. SST in EEP in November is most significantly correlated with the TP-SWE in next April, which suggests an accumulative effect of the ENSO on the TP snow cover. Although El Niño conditions could bring anomalous snowfall over the TP by generating a wave train entering the North African-Asian jet, it is questionable if this impact could change the thermal condition over the TP. There was almost no significant negative correlation between the SWE and TP surface temperature (representing the TP thermal condition) in winter. This suggests that the TP thermal condition hardly varies with the anomalous snowfall caused by this ENSO impact, despite some cooling effect of snowfall during the El Niño phase. On the contrary, preceding El Niño conditions tended to be associated with increasing TP surface temperature in May and there were significant positive correlations between SWE in April and TP surface temperature in May and June. ENSO might play a part in affecting TP thermal condition in a way that is quite different from the previous research. A plausible mechanism based on the relation of ENSO-TP thermal condition has been proposed. The mechanism explained the direct and indirect effects of ENSO on the TP thermal condition and role that the seasonal progress can play in this relation. The issues about snow cover aging and the impact of global warming, among others, were also included in the mechanism. View full abstract

 This article reports on the impacts of Himawari-8 Clear Sky Radiance (CSR) data assimilation in the global and mesoscale numerical weather prediction (NWP) systems of the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA). Adoption of the Advanced Himawari Imager (AHI) on board JMA’s Himawari-8 and -9 satellites has enhanced observational capabilities in terms of spectral, horizontal, and temporal resolution. Improvements brought by the switchover from the Multi-functional Transport Satellite-2 (MTSAT-2) to the new-generation Himawari-8 satellite include an upgrade to the horizontal resolution of CSR data from 64 to 32 km and an increase in the number of available water vapor bands from one to three. CSR products are obtained every hour and distributed to the NWP community. The improved horizontal and spectral resolution of Himawari-8 CSR data provides new information on horizontal water vapor distribution and vertical profiles in data assimilation.

 In data assimilation experiments using JMA’s global NWP system, the assimilation of Himawari-8’s three water vapor bands significantly improved the tropospheric humidity field in analysis, especially in the lower troposphere, as compared to assimilation of the single MTSAT-2 water vapor channel. First-guess (FG) departure statistics for microwave humidity sounders indicated an improvement in the water vapor field, especially over Himawari-8 observation areas. Improved forecasting of tropospheric temperature, humidity, and wind fields for Himawari-8 observation areas was also seen.

 In data assimilation experiments using JMA’s mesoscale NWP system, a disastrous heavy precipitation event that took place in Japan’s Kanto-Tohoku region in 2015 was investigated. A single water vapor band of Himawari-8 CSR corresponding to MTSAT-2 was assimilated, resulting in enhanced contrast of the water vapor field between moist and dry areas, as well as a realistic representation of moist air flows from the ocean in analysis. The changes also improved mesoscale model heavy precipitation forecasts.

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 The new geostationary meteorological satellite of the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA), Himawari-8, entered operation on 7 July 2015. Himawari-8 features the new 16-band Advanced Himawari Imager (AHI), whose spatial resolution and observation frequency are improved over those of its predecessor MTSAT-series satellites. These improvements will bring unprecedented levels of performance in nowcasting services and short-range weather forecasting systems. In view of the essential nature of navigation and radiometric calibration in fully leveraging the imager’s potential, this study reports on the current status of calibration for the AHI. Image navigation is accurate to within 1 km, and band-to-band co-registration has also been validated. Infrared-band calibration is accurate to within 0.2 K with no significant diurnal variation, and is being validated using an approach developed under the GSICS framework. Validation approaches are currently being tested for the visible and near-infrared bands. Two such approaches were compared and found to produce largely consistent results. View full abstract

 Rapid scan atmospheric motion vectors (RS-AMV) were derived with an algorithm developed by the Meteorological Satellite Center of the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) from Himawari-8 rapid scan imagery over the area around Japan. They were computed every 10 min for seven different channels, namely, the visible channel (VIS), near infrared and infrared channels (IR), three water vapor absorption channels (WV), and CO₂ absorption channel (CO₂), from image triplets with time intervals of 2.5 min for VIS and 5 min for the other six channels. In June 2016, the amount of data was increased by more than 20 times compared to the number of routinely used AMVs. To exploit these high-resolution data in mesoscale data assimilation for the improvement of short-range forecasts, data verification and assimilation experiments were conducted. The RS-AMVs were of sufficiently good quality for assimilation and consistent overall with winds from JMA’s mesoscale analyses, radiosonde, and wind profiler observations. Errors were slightly larger in WV than in VIS and IR channels. Significant negative biases relative to sonde winds were seen at high levels in VIS, IR, and CO₂, while slightly positive biases were noticeable in WV at mid- to high levels. Data assimilation experiments with the JMA’s non-hydrostatic model based Variational Data Assimilation System (JNoVA) on a cold vortex event in June 2016 were conducted using RS-AMVs from seven channels. The wind forecasts improved slightly in early forecast hours before 12 hours in northern Japan, over which the vortex passed during the assimilation period. They also showed small improvement at low levels when averaged over the whole forecast period. The results varied slightly depending on the channels used for assimilation, which might be caused by different error characteristics of RS-AMVs in different channels. View full abstract

 The present study compares contributions of different environmental factors to the tropical cyclone (TC) genesis over the western North Pacific (WNP) during 2015 and 2016. A local instantaneous view of conditions for the TC genesis is adopted in the present study, which is distinct from previous view of large-scale temporal averaged conditions. The present study also distinguishes the contributions of three time scale (synoptic, intraseasonal, and interannual) variations of various factors. Common to 2015 and 2016, the positive contribution of lower-level vorticity and upward motion to the TC genesis is mainly from the intraseasonal and synoptic components; the contribution of the barotropic energy conversion to the development of synoptic disturbances is larger from climatological mean winds and intraseasonal wind variations than from interannual wind variations; all three time scale variations of mid-level specific humidity contribute positively to the TC genesis; the barotropic energy conversion from climatological mean winds is due to the terms in relation to the meridional shear and zonal convergence of zonal wind. In comparison, the positive contribution of lower-level vorticity and mid-level specific humidity is larger in 2015 than in 2016 on all the three time scales; the contribution of the barotropic energy conversion in relation to the meridional shear of interannual variations of zonal wind and the zonal convergence of intraseasonal variations of zonal wind are larger in 2015 than in 2016; the vertical wind shear on all the three time scales and the sea surface temperature on the interannual time scale have a larger positive contribution to the TC genesis in 2016 than in 2015. View full abstract

 Two case studies of Mesoscale Convective System (MCS) in Indonesian region were conducted by applying an improved GTG tracking algorithm and ICAS algorithm to Himawari-8 AHI infrared data. The first case over Java Island showed a land-originating MCS in the boreal winter, which coincided with a wet phase of Madden-Julian Oscillation (MJO) over the Maritime Continent. The second case showed the evolution of MCS under the influence of a strong vertical wind shear during the boreal summer. The cloud top height (CTH) of deep convective part in the first case was larger than that in the second case, while the temporal evolution of CTH was similar between two cases. For the anvil part, the median CTH of the second case was relatively stable at around 13 km, while that of the first case showed a considerable temporal variation ranging from 14 to 16 km. The cloud-particle effective radius (CER) of anvil increased after the period of maximum deep convective CTH in both cases, although the CER was slightly larger in the second case than in the first case. These differences in cloud properties between two cases were attributable to the background wind profiles. View full abstract

 We developed an atmospheric gas absorption table for the Advanced Himawari Imager (AHI) based on the correlated k-distribution (CKD) method with the optimization method, which was used to determine quadrature weights and abscissas. We incorporated the table and band information of the AHI into a multi-purpose atmospheric radiative transfer package, Rstar. We updated the package so that users could easily specify the satellite and band number. Use of this update made it possible for the optimized CKD method to carry out calculations rapidly and accurately. Rstar is easy for beginners to use and facilitates comparison of results. Cloud retrieval tests using different numbers of quadrature points showed that cloud retrievals could be significantly affected by the accuracy of the CKD model.

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