ALBERT

Description: The severity of floods is shaped not only by event- and catchment-specific characteristics but also depends on the river network configuration. At the confluence of relevant tributaries with the main river, flood event characteristics may change depending on the magnitude and temporal match of flood waves. This superposition of flood waves may potentially increase the flood severity downstream in the main river. However, this aspect has not been analysed for a large set of river confluences to date. To fill this gap, the role of flood wave superposition in the flood severity at downstream gauges is investigated in four large river basins in Germany and Austria (the Elbe, the Danube, the Rhine and the Weser). A novel methodological approach to analyse flood wave superposition is presented and applied to mean daily discharge data from 37 triple points. A triple point consists of three gauges: one in the tributary as well as one upstream and downstream of the confluence with the main river respectively. At the triple points, differences and similarities in flood wave characteristics between the main river and the tributary are analysed in terms of the temporal match and the magnitudes of flood peaks. At many of the confluences analysed, the tributary peaks consistently arrive earlier than the main river peaks, although high variability in the time lag is generally detected. No large differences in temporal matching are detected for floods of different magnitudes. In the majority of cases, the largest floods at the downstream gauge do not occur due to perfect temporal match between the tributary and the main river. In terms of spatial variability, the impact of flood wave superposition is site-specific. Characteristic patterns of flood wave superposition are detected for flood peaks in the Danube River, where peak discharges largely increase due to inflow from alpine tributaries. Overall, we conclude that the superposition of flood waves is not the driving factor behind flood peak severity at the major confluences in Germany; however, a few confluences show the potential for strong flood magnifications if a temporal shift in flood waves was to occur.

Description: Hydrologic modeling is an essential strategy for understanding and predicting natural flows, particularly where observations are lacking in either space or time or where complex terrain leads to a disconnect in the characteristic time and space scales of overland and groundwater flow. However, significant difficulties remain for the development of efficient and extensible modeling systems that operate robustly across complex regions. This paper introduces the Simulator for Hydrologic Unstructured Domains (SHUD), an integrated, multiprocess, multiscale, flexible-time-step model, in which hydrologic processes are fully coupled using the finite volume method. SHUD integrates overland flow, snow accumulation/melt, evapotranspiration, subsurface flow, groundwater flow, and river routing, thus allowing physical processes in general watersheds to be realistically captured. SHUD incorporates one-dimensional unsaturated flow, two-dimensional groundwater flow, and a fully connected river channel network with hillslopes supporting overland flow and baseflow. The paper introduces the design of SHUD, from the conceptual and mathematical description of hydrologic processes in a watershed to the model's computational structures. To demonstrate and validate the model performance, we employ three hydrologic experiments: the V-catchment experiment, Vauclin's experiment, and a model study of the Cache Creek Watershed in northern California. Ongoing applications of the SHUD model include hydrologic analyses of hillslope to regional scales (1 m2 to 106 km2), water resource and stormwater management, and interdisciplinary research for questions in limnology, agriculture, geochemistry, geomorphology, water quality, ecology, climate and land-use change. The strength of SHUD is its flexibility as a scientific and resource evaluation tool where modeling and simulation are required.

Description: In recent years, sea spray as well as the biological material it contains has received increased attention as a source of ice-nucleating particles (INPs). Such INPs may play a role in remote marine regions, where other sources of INPs are scarce or absent. In the Arctic, these INPs can influence water–ice partitioning in low-level clouds and thereby the cloud lifetime, with consequences for the surface energy budget, sea ice formation and melt, and climate. Marine aerosol is of a diverse nature, so identifying sources of INPs is challenging. One fraction of marine bioaerosol (phytoplankton and their exudates) has been a particular focus of marine INP research. In our study we attempt to address three main questions. Firstly, we compare the ice-nucleating ability of two common phytoplankton species with Arctic seawater microlayer samples using the same instrumentation to see if these phytoplankton species produce ice-nucleating material with sufficient activity to account for the ice nucleation observed in Arctic microlayer samples. We present the first measurements of the ice-nucleating ability of two predominant phytoplankton species: Melosira arctica, a common Arctic diatom species, and Skeletonema marinoi, a ubiquitous diatom species across oceans worldwide. To determine the potential effect of nutrient conditions and characteristics of the algal culture, such as the amount of organic carbon associated with algal cells, on the ice nucleation activity, Skeletonema marinoi was grown under different nutrient regimes. From comparison of the ice nucleation data of the algal cultures to those obtained from a range of sea surface microlayer (SML) samples obtained during three different field expeditions to the Arctic (ACCACIA, NETCARE, and ASCOS), we found that they were not as ice active as the investigated microlayer samples, although these diatoms do produce ice-nucleating material. Secondly, to improve our understanding of local Arctic marine sources as atmospheric INPs we applied two aerosolization techniques to analyse the ice-nucleating ability of aerosolized microlayer and algal samples. The aerosols were generated either by direct nebulization of the undiluted bulk solutions or by the addition of the samples to a sea spray simulation chamber filled with artificial seawater. The latter method generates aerosol particles using a plunging jet to mimic the process of oceanic wave breaking. We observed that the aerosols produced using this approach can be ice active, indicating that the ice-nucleating material in seawater can indeed transfer to the aerosol phase. Thirdly, we attempted to measure ice nucleation activity across the entire temperature range relevant for mixed-phase clouds using a suite of ice nucleation measurement techniques – an expansion cloud chamber, a continuous-flow diffusion chamber, and a cold stage. In order to compare the measurements made using the different instruments, we have normalized the data in relation to the mass of salt present in the nascent sea spray aerosol. At temperatures above 248 K some of the SML samples were very effective at nucleating ice, but there was substantial variability between the different samples. In contrast, there was much less variability between samples below 248 K. We discuss our results in the context of aerosol–cloud interactions in the Arctic with a focus on furthering our understanding of which INP types may be important in the Arctic atmosphere.

Description: The mineralogy and mixing state of dust particles originating from the African continent influences climate and marine ecosystems in the North Atlantic due to its effect on radiation, cloud properties and biogeochemical cycling. However, these processes are difficult to constrain because of large temporal and spatial variability, and the lack of in situ measurements of dust properties at all stages of the dust cycle. This lack of measurements is in part due to the remoteness of potential source areas (PSAs) and transport pathways but also because of the lack of an efficient method to report the mineralogy and mixing state of single particles with a time resolution comparable to atmospheric processes, which may last a few hours or less. Measurements are equally challenging in laboratory simulations where dust particles need to be isolated and characterised in low numbers whilst conditions are dynamically controlled and monitored in real time. This is particularly important in controlled expansion cloud chambers (CECCs) where ice-nucleating properties of suspended dust samples are studied in cold and mixed phase cloud conditions. In this work, the mineralogy and mixing state of the fine fraction (

Description: We present the laboratory results of immersion freezing efficiencies of cellulose particles at supercooled temperature (T) conditions. Three types of chemically homogeneous cellulose samples are used as surrogates that represent supermicron and submicron ice-nucleating plant structural polymers. These samples include microcrystalline cellulose (MCC), fibrous cellulose (FC) and nanocrystalline cellulose (NCC). Our immersion freezing dataset includes data from various ice nucleation measurement techniques available at 17 different institutions, including nine dry dispersion and 11 aqueous suspension techniques. With a total of 20 methods, we performed systematic accuracy and precision analysis of measurements from all 20 measurement techniques by evaluating T-binned (1 ∘C) data over a wide T range (−36 ∘C 

Description: Mean age of stratospheric air can be derived from observations of sufficiently long-lived trace gases with approximately linear trends in the troposphere. Mean age can serve as a tracer to investigate stratospheric transport and long-term changes in the strength of the overturning Brewer–Dobson circulation of the stratosphere. For this purpose, a low-cost method is required in order to allow for regular observations up to altitudes of about 30 km. Despite the desired low costs, high precision and accuracy are required in order to determine mean age. We present balloon-borne AirCore observations from two midlatitude sites: Timmins in Ontario/Canada and Lindenberg in Germany. During the Timmins campaign, five AirCores sampled air in parallel with a large stratospheric balloon and were analysed for CO2, CH4 and partly CO. We show that there is good agreement between the different AirCores (better than 0.1 %), especially when vertical gradients are small. The measurements from Lindenberg were performed using small low-cost balloons and yielded very comparable results. We have used the observations to extend our long-term data set of mean age observations at Northern Hemisphere midlatitudes. The time series now covers more than 40 years and shows a small, statistically non-significant positive trend of 0.15 ± 0.18 years decade−1. This trend is slightly smaller than the previous estimate of 0.24 ± 0.22 years decade−1 which was based on observations up to the year 2006. These observations are still in contrast to strong negative trends of mean age as derived from some model calculations.

Description: The second phase of the Fifth International Ice Nucleation Workshop (FIN-02) involved the gathering of a large number of researchers at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology's Aerosol Interactions and Dynamics of the Atmosphere (AIDA) facility to promote characterization and understanding of ice nucleation measurements made by a variety of methods used worldwide. Compared to the previous workshop in 2007, participation was doubled, reflecting a vibrant research area. Experimental methods involved sampling of aerosol particles by direct processing ice nucleation measuring systems from the same volume of air in separate experiments using different ice nucleating particle (INP) types, and collections of aerosol particle samples onto filters or into liquid for sharing amongst measurement techniques that post-process these samples. In this manner, any errors introduced by differences in generation methods when samples are shared across laboratories were mitigated. Furthermore, as much as possible, aerosol particle size distribution was controlled so that the size limitations of different methods were minimized. The results presented here use data from the workshop to assess the comparability of immersion freezing measurement methods activating INPs in bulk suspensions, methods that activate INPs in condensation and/or immersion freezing modes as single particles on a substrate, continuous flow diffusion chambers (CFDCs) directly sampling and processing particles well above water saturation to maximize immersion and subsequent freezing of aerosol particles, and expansion cloud chamber simulations in which liquid cloud droplets were first activated on aerosol particles prior to freezing. The AIDA expansion chamber measurements are expected to be the closest representation to INP activation in atmospheric cloud parcels in these comparisons, due to exposing particles freely to adiabatic cooling. The different particle types used as INPs included the minerals illite NX and potassium feldspar (K-feldspar), two natural soil dusts representative of arable sandy loam (Argentina) and highly erodible sandy dryland (Tunisia) soils, respectively, and a bacterial INP (Snomax®). Considered together, the agreement among post-processed immersion freezing measurements of the numbers and fractions of particles active at different temperatures following bulk collection of particles into liquid was excellent, with possible temperature uncertainties inferred to be a key factor in determining INP uncertainties. Collection onto filters for rinsing versus directly into liquid in impingers made little difference. For methods that activated collected single particles on a substrate at a controlled humidity at or above water saturation, agreement with immersion freezing methods was good in most cases, but was biased low in a few others for reasons that have not been resolved, but could relate to water vapor competition effects. Amongst CFDC-style instruments, various factors requiring (variable) higher supersaturations to achieve equivalent immersion freezing activation dominate the uncertainty between these measurements, and for comparison with bulk immersion freezing methods. When operated above water saturation to include assessment of immersion freezing, CFDC measurements often measured at or above the upper bound of immersion freezing device measurements, but often underestimated INP concentration in comparison to an immersion freezing method that first activates all particles into liquid droplets prior to cooling (the PIMCA-PINC device, or Portable Immersion Mode Cooling chAmber–Portable Ice Nucleation Chamber), and typically slightly underestimated INP number concentrations in comparison to cloud parcel expansions in the AIDA chamber; this can be largely mitigated when it is possible to raise the relative humidity to sufficiently high values in the CFDCs, although this is not always possible operationally. Correspondence of measurements of INPs among direct sampling and post-processing systems varied depending on the INP type. Agreement was best for Snomax® particles in the temperature regime colder than −10 ∘C, where their ice nucleation activity is nearly maximized and changes very little with temperature. At temperatures warmer than −10 ∘C, Snomax® INP measurements (all via freezing of suspensions) demonstrated discrepancies consistent with previous reports of the instability of its protein aggregates that appear to make it less suitable as a calibration INP at these temperatures. For Argentinian soil dust particles, there was excellent agreement across all measurement methods; measures ranged within 1 order of magnitude for INP number concentrations, active fractions and calculated active site densities over a 25 to 30 ∘C range and 5 to 8 orders of corresponding magnitude change in number concentrations. This was also the case for all temperatures warmer than −25 ∘C in Tunisian dust experiments. In contrast, discrepancies in measurements of INP concentrations or active site densities that exceeded 2 orders of magnitude across a broad range of temperature measurements found at temperatures warmer than −25 ∘C in a previous study were replicated for illite NX. Discrepancies also exceeded 2 orders of magnitude at temperatures of −20 to −25 ∘C for potassium feldspar (K-feldspar), but these coincided with the range of temperatures at which INP concentrations increase rapidly at approximately an order of magnitude per 2 ∘C cooling for K-feldspar. These few discrepancies did not outweigh the overall positive outcomes of the workshop activity, nor the future utility of this data set or future similar efforts for resolving remaining measurement issues. Measurements of the same materials were repeatable over the time of the workshop and demonstrated strong consistency with prior studies, as reflected by agreement of data broadly with parameterizations of different specific or general (e.g., soil dust) aerosol types. The divergent measurements of the INP activity of illite NX by direct versus post-processing methods were not repeated for other particle types, and the Snomax® data demonstrated that, at least for a biological INP type, there is no expected measurement bias between bulk collection and direct immediately processed freezing methods to as warm as −10 ∘C. Since particle size ranges were limited for this workshop, it can be expected that for atmospheric populations of INPs, measurement discrepancies will appear due to the different capabilities of methods for sampling the full aerosol size distribution, or due to limitations on achieving sufficient water supersaturations to fully capture immersion freezing in direct processing instruments. Overall, this workshop presents an improved picture of present capabilities for measuring INPs than in past workshops, and provides direction toward addressing remaining measurement issues.

Description: Atmospheric dynamical cores are a fundamental component of global atmospheric modeling systems and are responsible for capturing the dynamical behavior of the Earth's atmosphere via numerical integration of the Navier–Stokes equations. These systems have existed in one form or another for over half of a century, with the earliest discretizations having now evolved into a complex ecosystem of algorithms and computational strategies. In essence, no two dynamical cores are alike, and their individual successes suggest that no perfect model exists. To better understand modern dynamical cores, this paper aims to provide a comprehensive review of 11 non-hydrostatic dynamical cores, drawn from modeling centers and groups that participated in the 2016 Dynamical Core Model Intercomparison Project (DCMIP) workshop and summer school. This review includes a choice of model grid, variable placement, vertical coordinate, prognostic equations, temporal discretization, and the diffusion, stabilization, filters, and fixers employed by each system.

Description: Absolute gravity measurements have been regularly performed in the Austrian Eastern Alps since 1985. A gravity increase of 300 nm s−2 has been observed so far. The gravity trend is explained by ablation effects within surrounding glaciers. Ice thickness changes derived from 3 successive glacier inventories of 1969, 1997 and 2006 are used for quantitative 3-D modeling based on rectangular prisms with basis areas of ≤ 8 m × 8 m. Local topographic changes due to man-made mass displacements close to the measuring site are modeled by a polyhedron approach. Two-thirds (2/3) of the observed gravity increase can be explained by the ablation model response and man-made effects. A positive trend of about 100 nm s−2 remains. The origin of the residual trend remains open. Correcting for geodynamical processes like Alpine uplift or postglacial deformation is expected to cause a slight increase of this trend. The observed gravity signal shows seasonal gravity variations as well, which are probably due to snow cover effects but cannot be quantified due to the lack of appropriate snow cover information.

Description: Absolute gravity measurements have been regularly performed in the Austrian Eastern Alps since 1985 until present. A gravity increase of 300 nm s−2 has been observed so far. The gravity trend is explained by ablation effects within surrounding glaciers. Ice thickness changes derived from 3 successive glacier inventories of 1969, 1997 and 2006 are used for quantitative 3-D modeling based on rectangular prisms with basis areas of ≤ 8 m × 8 m. Local topographic changes due to man-made mass displacements close to the measuring site are modeled by a polyhedron approach. 2/3 of the observed gravity increase can be explained by the ablation model response and man-made effects. A positive trend of about 100 nm s−2 remains. The origin of the residual trend remains open. Correcting for geodynamical processes like Alpine uplift or postglacial deformation is expected to cause a slight increase of this trend. The observed gravity signal shows seasonal gravity variations as well which are probably due to snow cover effects but cannot be quantified due to the lack of appropriate snow cover information.