ARM Best Estimate Data Produced for TRACER Campaign

Published: 7 June 2023

The top figure shows relative humidity scaled, by total column amount from MWR, from sounding in height coordinate (%), from TRACER, for the first 120 days of 2022. The y-axis represents height from 0 to 15 kilometers. The bottom figure shows surface precipitation from TRACER in the first 120 days of 2022. The precipitation rate is from 0 to 25 mm/hour. — ARMBEATM relative humidity (top) and surface precipitation (bottom) are shown for the first 120 days of 2022 during the TRacking Aerosol Convection interactions Experiment (TRACER).

The Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) user facility provides tailored datastreams known as ARM Best Estimate (ARMBE) data products for use in the evaluation of global climate models.

Two ARMBE data sets are now available from the TRacking Aerosol Convection interactions ExpeRiment (TRACER), which ran from October 2021 through September 2022 near Houston, Texas.

ARMBECLDRAD cloud fraction (top) on May 5, 2022, during TRACER is derived from the Ka-Band ARM Zenith Radar Active Remote Sensing of CLouds (KAZRARSCL) data product (bottom). The top plot is labeled "CloudFraction (%) ARMBE," and the bottom plot is labeled "Cloud detection (color) and cloud base (white)" with the datastream name houarsclkazr1kolliasM1.c0. — ARMBECLDRAD cloud fraction (top) on May 5, 2022, at the TRACER ARM Mobile Facility site is derived from the Ka-Band ARM Zenith Radar Active Remote Sensing of CLouds (KAZRARSCL) data product (bottom).

The ARM Best Estimate Atmospheric Measurements (ARMBEATM) data set contains basic atmospheric quantities, and ARM Best Estimate Cloud Radiation (ARMBECLDRAD) provides cloud and radiation quantities.

An ARMBE product assembles quantities that are both well observed by ARM over many years and are often used in model evaluation into one data set. Such products consist of hourly averages and thus have temporal resolution comparable to a typical resolution used in climate model output.

Scientists can use the ARMBEATM and ARMBECLDRAD data from TRACER now. Find more information about ARMBE data products on the ARMBE web page.

Feedback on the data is always welcome. If you have questions or suggestions, please contact Yuying Zhang or Shaocheng Xie.

Users can access the new TRACER data in the ARM Data Center. (Go here to create an account to download the data.)

To cite these data, use doi:10.5439/1333748 for ARMBEATM and doi:10.5439/1333228 for ARMBECLDRAD.

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ARM is a DOE Office of Science user facility operated by nine DOE national laboratories.