Effects of Saharan Dust on the African Easterly Jet-African Easterly Wave System

GSTDTAP

项目编号	1624414
	Effects of Saharan Dust on the African Easterly Jet-African Easterly Wave System
	Terrence Nathan
主持机构	University of California-Davis
项目开始年	2017
	2017-03-01
项目结束日期	2020-02-29
资助机构	US-NSF
项目类别	Continuing grant
项目经费	192355(USD)
国家	美国
语种	英语
英文摘要	North Africa is home to the African easterly jet, a current of strong easterly winds located in the lower atmosphere. The African easterly jet often gives birth to weather systems known as African easterly waves. Together the jet and the waves form a complex system whose influence on weather can extend to the United States. That influence often manifests as tropical cyclones, whose genesis has been linked to the easterly waves. Consequently, to understand the connection between the weather over North Africa and the development of tropical cyclones, it is important to understand the processes that affect the African easterly jet‒African easterly wave system. Of those processes, the heating effects of Saharan dust storms are among the least understood, yet potentially among the most important. The central objective of this proposal is to advance understanding of the effects of Saharan dust storms on the intra-seasonal and inter-annual variability of the African easterly jet‒African easterly wave system. To achieve this objective, a unified work plan is developed that combines numerical experiments, observational analysis, and model verification. To guide the numerical experiments and to aid in the interpretation of the results, a theoretical framework will be developed that exposes the dust-modified physics operating within the system. The scientific merits of the proposed research include: understanding the pathways that communicate the effects of Saharan dust to the African easterly jet‒African easterly wave system; providing a physical basis for explaining how Saharan dust affects the temporal variability of the system; and evaluating the importance of Saharan dust to the life cycles of the easterly waves. The broader impacts of the proposed research include: additional understanding of how Saharan dust affects the circulation over North Africa, which will aid the scientific community?s efforts to improve weather forecasts for the region; improved representation of the dust-modified system, which will benefit future studies that seek to advance understanding and improve forecasting of tropical cyclones over the Eastern Atlantic Ocean; development of a theoretical framework for understanding the dust-modified circulation, which can be used as an interpretive tool for numerical modeling and observational studies of the weather over North Africa; and the scientific training of undergraduate and graduate students in the discipline of atmospheric sciences.
来源学科分类	Geosciences - Atmospheric and Geospace Sciences
文献类型	项目
条目标识符	http://119.78.100.173/C666/handle/2XK7JSWQ/70855
专题	环境与发展全球科技态势
推荐引用方式 GB/T 7714	Terrence Nathan.Effects of Saharan Dust on the African Easterly Jet-African Easterly Wave System.2017.