| Session Details | |
| Section | AS - Atmospheric Sciences |
| Session Title | Precipitation Science And Application Of Satellite Data In Asia |
| Main Convener | Prof. Yukari Takayabu (The University of Tokyo, Japan) |
| Co-convener(s) | Dr. Gail Jackson (NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, United States) Prof. Kenji Nakamura (Dokkyo University, Japan) Dr. Kusma Rao (Institute for Advanced Research in Science, India) Dr. Jinho Shin (National Meteorological Satellite Centre, Korea, South) |
| Session Description | To understand the Asian monsoon, which strongly affects weather and climate, ecosystem and human society in Asia, understandings of precipitation are essential. A full-scale satellite observation of precipitation started with the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) equipped with five instruments including the Precipitation Radar, and accumulated data for more than 17 years. TRMM revealed various characteristics of precipitation, advanced understandings of precipitation mechanisms, and gave clues to improve climate models. A new research discipline “precipitation system climatology” started with the TRMM observation. TRMM also played an important role as a flying-rain-gauge to calibrate microwave radiometers in space for advanced near real time global precipitation map products, such as, the Global Satellite Mapping of Precipitation (GSMaP) and TRMM Multisatellite Precipitation Analysis (TMPA) or later Integrated Multi-satellitE Retrievals for GPM (IMERG). These products have been operationally used for weather forecasting, flood warnings, and river controls. Overlapping one year with TRMM, the Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) mission has started in February 2014, and has collected data for almost two years. One advanced instrument on the GPM core satellite is the Dual Frequency Radar (GPM/DPR) which provides detailed information on the microphysical processes of precipitation. Another is the GPM Microwave Imager (GMI) with additional high frequency channels. These instruments could contribute to better understandings of light rain and falling snow precipitation processes. While the GPM core satellite inter-calibrates multiple satellite data to produce uniform global precipitation estimates over the globe, satellite estimates still have errors depending on seasons and regions. Thus ground validations of satellite precipitation estimates in different conditions are essential in the GPM project. This session solicits studies on following topics: 1. Science of precipitation systems utilizing satellite and radar data. 2. Ground validation of satellite precipitation data 3. Applications of satellite precipitation data in Asia. |