Forecasting and Modeling Support

Investigation Description: This collaborative effort by scientists at Johns Hopkins University, Columbia University, and the Meteorology CRC (Australia) will provide stratospheric forecasting and chemical transport modeling support for SOLVE.

Real-time stratospheric analyses and forecasts from the Australian BOM Global ASsimilation and Prediction (GASP) system will be provided for flight planning and post-flight data analysis. The GASP system is a global analysis/forecast system, and GASP analyses and forecasts have been used in previous NASA aircraft campaigns (ASHOE/MAESA, STRAT, VOTE/TOTE, and POLARIS). The provided data include forecast temperature, wind, and potential vorticity fields, high-resolution trajectory fields (calculated using both Contour Advection and Reverse Domain Filling techniques), and 10-day back trajectories from flight paths.

To assist in mission design and to help interpret observations, we will use a hierarchy of models, including isentropic trajectory calculations and three-dimensional chemical transport models. The models will allow us to examine:

1. the effect of transport on the correlation of long-lived trace gases with ozone, and techniques to account for these transport effects when using correlations to estimate polar ozone loss;
2. transport rates into, out of, and within polar regions;
3. timescales for transport over wider latitudinal regions of the stratosphere;
4. sensitivity of photochemical box model calculations to initial conditions and temperature history of air masses; and
5. evolution of the 3-D distributions of chemical species through the 1999/2000 winter.