DEVEX-disdrometer evaluation experiment: Basic results and implications for hydrologic studies

Increasing our understanding of the small scale variability of drop size distributions (DSD), and therefore of several bulk characteristics of rainfall processes, has major implications for our interpretation of the remote sensing based estimates of precipitation and its uncertainty. During the spring and summer of 2002 the authors conducted the DEVEX experiment (disdrometer evaluation experiment) to compare measurements of natural rain made with three different types of disdrometers collocated at the Iowa City Municipal Airport in Iowa City, Iowa in the Midwestern United States. This paper focuses on the evaluation of the instruments rather than analysis of the hydrometeorological aspects of the observed events. The comparison demonstrates discrepancies between instruments. The authors discuss the systematic and random effects in terms of rainfall quantities, drop size distribution properties, and the observed drop size vs. velocity relationships. Since the instruments were collocated, the effects of the natural variability of rain are reduced some with time integration, isolating the instrumental differences. The authors discuss the status of DSD measurement technologies and the implications for a range of hydrologic applications from remote sensing of rainfall to atmospheric deposition to soil erosion and sediment transport in the environment. The data set collected during the DEVEX experiment is made available to the research community.     

南海热带气旋路径集合预报试验

利用3种不同模式的初始资料，通过它们生成得到16个不同的初始场，分别对2004年南海及其周边地区9个热带气旋个例进行集合预报试验，最后筛选得到了7个南海热带气旋初值集合成员，由此初步探讨了南海热带气旋初值集合成员的生成方法。结果表明，采用不同模式的初始资料生成得到初值集合成员的方法用于集合预报，对南海热带气旋路径预报有一些明显的改进。     

Study on the Variational Assimilation Technique for the Retrieval of Wind Fields from Doppler Radar Data

This paper introduces a variational assimilation technique for the retrieval of wind fields from Doppler radar data. The assimilated information included both the radial velocity (RV) and the movement of radar echo. In this assimilation technique, the key is transforming the movement of radar echo to a new radar measuring variable- "apparent velocity" (AV). Thus, the information of wind is added, and the indeterminacy of recovering two-dimensional wind only by AV was overcome effectively by combining RV with AV. By means of CMA GRAPES-3Dvar and CINRAD data, some experiments were performed. The results show that the method of retrieval of wind fields is useful in obtaining the construction of the weather system.     

由多个震源机制解分析民乐Ms6.1级地震前后应力场演化

2003年10月25日在甘肃省民乐县和山丹县境内发生了Ms6．1与Ms5．8级地震，对震区200km范围、震前2年内发生的地震，及对震后部分余震矩张量反演得到它们的震源机制解，并对其进行统计分析得到该区的背景应力场及应力轴的整体特征，根据发震区地质构造背景和对平均应力场变化分析，寻求民乐地震的发震机制。     

吴堡矿区横沟井田矿井充水因素评价

吴堡矿区赋存着丰富的煤炭资源,但开采技术条件较复杂,其中水文地质条件复杂是影响煤炭开采的主要不利开采技术条件。本文依据横沟井田勘探资料,较全面地分析了井田水文地质条件,并着重评价了井田矿井充水因素。认为黄河水对横沟井田煤炭开采无影响;奥灰承压水对山西组煤层开采在正常地段不会造成危害,对太原组煤层开采有很大的威胁。并提出太原组煤层能否开采利用,还需进一步作详细地质勘查研究工作。     

Correcting superconducting gravity time-series using rainfall modelling at the Vienna and Membach stations and application to Earth tide analysis

We demonstrate the possibility to improve the signal-to-noise ratio of superconducting gravity time-series by correcting for local hydrological effects. Short-term atmospheric events associated with heavy rain induce step-like gravity signals that deteriorate the frequency spectrum estimates. Based on 4D modeling constrained by high temporal resolution rain gauge data, rainfall admittances for the Vienna and Membach superconducting gravity stations are calculated. This allows routine correction for Newtonian rain water effects, which reduces the standard deviation of residuals after tidal parameter adjustment by 10%. It also improves the correction of steps of instrumental origin when they coincide with step-like water mass signals.     

Photobleaching of chromophoric dissolved organic matter (CDOM) in rainwater

Significant photodegradation of chromophoric dissolved organic matter (CDOM) in rainwater was observed after exposure to simulated sunlight. Fluorescence excitation emission spectra (EEMS) of precipitation revealed the presence of four major peaks all of which degraded upon photolysis with the greatest loss in the region characteristic of marine CDOM. Photobleaching of absorbance also occurred in the wavelength region between 250 and 375 nm with the greatest loss of absorbance in the upper end of the UV-A region near 275 nm. There was a strong positive correlation between absorbance loss and total integrated fluorescence loss suggesting these optical properties and the degree to which they are photobleached in rainwater are directly related. The quantum yield of CDOM photodegradation in rainwater decreased dramatically with increasing wavelength and decreasing energy of incoming radiation with the average quantum yield at 325 nm approximately an order of magnitude greater than at 460 nm. The similarity of photolytic response between rainwater and Cape Fear estuarine CDOM indicates that some fraction of the compounds that make up rainwater CDOM may be derived from surface sources and/or that the processes that produce or modify humic-like substances in the atmosphere result in similar types of compounds as non-atmospheric processes.     

Disc structure around strongly magnetic accretors: a full disc solution with buoyancy diffusivity

A full numerical solution is found for the effect of a strongly magnetic star on its accretion disc, for the case of magnetic buoyancy diffusion. As in the previously considered case of turbulent diffusion, the disc becomes disrupted when magnetic and viscous stresses become comparable. A magnetically induced temperature elevation leads to electron scattering opacity and radiation pressure becoming significant far from the stellar surface, with consequent viscous instability and vertical disruption of the disc. This, together with the previous turbulent case, suggests that such a disruption mechanism owing to strongly magnetic accretors is generally operable.     

Spectroscopic observations of the eclipsing polar MN Hya (RX J0929–24)

We present low–medium resolution optical spectroscopy of the eclipsing AM Her system MN Hya (RX J0929–24). We determine the magnetic field strength at the primary accretion region of the white dwarf to be 42 MG from the spacing of cyclotron features visible during π ∼ 0.4–0.7. From spectra taken during the eclipse we find that the secondary has an M3–4 spectral type. Combined with the eclipse photometry of Sekiguchi, Nakada &38; Bassett and an estimate of the interstellar extinction we find a distance of ∼300–700 pc. We find unusual line variations at π ∼ 0.9: Hα is seen in absorption and emission. This is at the same point in the orbital phase at which a prominent absorption dip is seen in soft X-rays.     

PSR J1012+5307: younger than it looks?

Lorimer et al. have recently reported that the spin-down age (∼7 × 10⁹ yr) of the low-mass binary pulsar PSR J1012+5307 is much higher than the cooling age (3 × 10⁸ yr) of its white dwarf companion. The proposed solutions for this discrepancy are outlined and discussed. In particular, the revised cooling age estimate proposed by Alberts et al. agrees with data from other low-mass binary pulsar systems if a transition to the 'classical' cooling regime occurs between ∼0.14 and ∼0.28 M_⊙. If this transition is excluded, PSR J1012+5307 seems to have finished its accretion phase far from the spin-up line.