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American Meteorological Society, Journal of Climate, 1(7), p. 158-173, 1994

DOI: 10.1175/1520-0442(1994)007<0158:aodsop>2.0.co;2

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A One-Dimensional Study of Possible Cirrus Cloud Feedbacks

Journal article published in 1993 by Ashok Sinha, Keith P. Shine ORCID
This paper is made freely available by the publisher.
This paper is made freely available by the publisher.

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Green circle
Preprint: archiving allowed
Green circle
Postprint: archiving allowed
Orange circle
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Data provided by SHERPA/RoMEO

Abstract

A standard radiative-convective model with high vertical resolution (10-mb grid spacing in the upper troposphere) is used to investigate some of these feedbacks in response to changes in atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration. It is shown that such a high resolution (or, indeed, an even higher resolution) may be necessary to resolve the change in tropopause height following a doubling of carbon dioxide. The cirrus cloud is allowed to adjust its height and ice water content in response to the warming, and experiments are repeated: 1) for fixed and moist adiabatic lapse rates, 2) with and without a prescribed relative humidity feedback, 3) at low as well as high vertical resolution, and 4) with the inclusion of a simple correction to account for the uncertain number of small ice crystals in cirrus clouds. The results imply that models with a coarse vertical resolution may be unable to capture small changes in cloud position that could substantially affect the overall strength of cirrus cloud feedbacks. -from Authors