Move a Tropical Cyclone with 4D-Var and Vortex Dynamical Initialization in WRF Model

Previous studies showed that 4 D-Var technique used for data assimilation could be modified for weather control. This study demonstrates the ability of 4 D-Var to influence the future path of a tropical cyclone by calculating perturbations in WRF simulation. Given the background error covariance matrix, the initial field is improved by the vortex dynamic initialization technique. Our results show that 4 D-Var can be applied to control the trajectory of simulated tropical cyclones by producing "optimal" perturbations. In the numerical simulation experiment of Typhoon Mitag in 2019, after this kind of weather control similar to data assimilation, the tropical cyclone moved obviously,and the damaging wind over the coastline weakened. The prediction results after the initial field modified by 4 D-Var have a great change, and the position of the tropical cyclone moved about 0.5° southeastward after assimilation,which misses the southeast coast of China. Moreover, the damaging wind is also weakened. Since the 4 D-Var is premised on the assumption that the model is perfect and does not consider the model error, then the research plan to consider model error and introduce new methods is discussed in the paper.     

Urbanization Impact on Regional Climate and Extreme Weather: Current Understanding,Uncertainties, and Future Research Directions

Urban environments lie at the confluence of social,cultural,and economic activities and have unique biophysical characteristics due to continued infrastructure development that generally replaces natural landscapes with built-up structures.The vast majority of studies on urban perturbation of local weather and climate have been centered on the urban heat island(UHI)effect,referring to the higher temperature in cities compared to their natural surroundings.Besides the UHI effect and heat waves,urbanization also impacts atmospheric moisture,wind,boundary layer structure,cloud formation,dispersion of air pollutants,precipitation,and storms.In this review article,we first introduce the datasets and methods used in studying urban areas and their impacts through both observation and modeling and then summarize the scientific insights on the impact of urbanization on various aspects of regional climate and extreme weather based on more than 500 studies.We also highlight the major research gaps and challenges in our understanding of the impacts of urbanization and provide our perspective and recommendations for future research priorities and directions.