| Session Details | |
| Section | AS - Atmospheric Sciences |
| Session Title | Clouds, Convection, Radiation, Water and Energy Cycles in Coupled Climate Systems: Observations and Modeling |
| Main Convener | Dr. Jui-Lin (Frank) Li (Jet Propulsion Laboratory/California Institute of Technology (Caltech), United States) |
| Co-convener(s) | Prof. Masahiro Watanabe (The University of Tokyo, Japan) Prof. Huang-Hsiung Hsu (Academia Sinica, Taiwan) Dr. Kuan-Man Xu (NASA Langley Research Center, United States) Dr. Wei-Liang Lee (Academia Sinica, Taiwan) Prof. MinHui Lo (Atmos Sci, National Taiwan University, Taiwan) Dr. Tristan L'Ecuyer (University of Wisconsin-Madison, United States) |
| Session Description | Clouds in the climate system continue to be the largest uncertainty for example in radiation, cloud-feedbacks and remains challenging to examine both in observations and modeling reported in the IPCC AR5 (CMIP5). Key issues include, the representation of convection and cloud microphysical processes as well as their interactions with land/ocean processes etc. This conclusion is reached by considering a plausible range of unknown contributions by processes yet to be accounted for in current climate models. Lacking of robust analysis and direct constraints with substantial ambiguity remains in the observations of global-scale cloud variability and trends. Thus, improving the predictive capabilities of climate models, essential for the future IPCC AR6 (CMIP6), requires a coordinated analysis of the interactions between convection, clouds, radiation, and precipitation using both models and observations. To foster collaborations between these communities we invite papers covering: 1) observations of convection, clouds, and the radiation budget; 2) evaluation of cloud and radiative properties in climate models; 3) characterization of the impacts of model biases in coupled atmosphere-ocean-land systems in the CMIP5 and pre-CMIP6 climate modeling. |