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North American Monsoon Precipitation Projections





My current doctoral work looks at the precipitation response to climate warming for the North American Monsoon (NAM). Global climate model projections of future precipitation in the NAM can often be subjected to error due to improper representation of mesoscale features. A continental-scale convection-permitting regional climate model at 4km resolution is used to examine the NAM precipitation response to large scale warming using pseudo-global warming experiments. Unlike projections from coarser scale models, the 4km convection-permitting model shows a widespread increase in overall NAM precipitation for much of the region. These precipitation increases are primarily made up of an increase in the frequency of intense precipitation events (>3mm/hr) despite a reduction in the frequency of all other events. This change in the frequency of precipitation events is attributed to large scale changes in specific humidity. Greater atmospheric moisture concentrations allow for stronger moisture fluxes from the Gulf of California to penetrate inland into the mountains of central Arizona and western Mexico. This results in a greater convergence of moisture along the mountain peaks where diurnal convection is often initiated, resulting in more water to be precipitated out. This work is currently being prepared for publication. Links will be updated once up!

The Snow-Albedo Feedback & Orographic Convection



This is work that was completed as part of my Masters research looking at the dynamics of the snow-albedo feedback (SAF). Transient snow cover in mountainous regions are susceptible to an increased reduction in the Spring and early Summer months under anthropogenic climate warming. Reduced snow cover leads to enhanced differential heating at the surface and can result in the generation of mesoscale terrain-driven circulations. These circulations lead to enhanced convergence and convection along the snowline. An alteration of local CAPE and CIN indices are also modified by changes in atmospheric temperature and specific humidity that result from large-scale warming and can locally be enhanced SAF induced warming in mountainous regions. Read more here.

Tornado Density Mapping

Tornado density mapping is a common technique employed in the creation of regional and national tornado climatologies yet there are many geospatial considerations that must be taken into account when performing a weighted kernel density analysis. The performance of several density functions on composite national tornado point datasets were compared and analyzed. Results demonstrated that a Modified Guassian technique was most beneficial as it captured smaller, more localized variations in tornado density than other functions. Read more here.


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