Publications related to ESM-SnowMIP: assessing snow models and quantifying snow-related climate feedbacks

Good enough: Intermediate complexity atmospheric models improve the representation of processes affecting seasonal snow

Snow plays a crucial role in processes regulating ecosystems, the climate, and human development. Mountain snowpack in particular has great relevance for downstream communities. Knowledge about the distribution and properties of the snowpack thus help in p ...

EPFL2024

Intermediate complexity atmospheric modeling in complex terrain: is it right?

Michael Lehning, Dylan Stewart Reynolds, Michael Haugeneder

Dynamic downscaling of atmospheric forcing data to the hectometer resolution has shown increases in accuracy for landsurface models, but at great computational cost. Here we present a validation of a novel intermediate complexity atmospheric model, HICAR, ...

Frontiers Media Sa2024

A seasonal snowpack model forced with dynamically downscaled forcing data resolves hydrologically relevant accumulation patterns

Michael Lehning, Tobias Jonas, Dylan Stewart Reynolds

The Mountain snowpack stores months of winter precipitation at high elevations, supplying snowmelt to lowland areas in drier seasons for agriculture and human consumption worldwide. Accurate seasonal predictions of the snowpack are thus of great importance ...

Frontiers Media Sa2024

On the importance of the humidity flux for the surface mass balance in the accumulation zone of the Greenland Ice Sheet

Sonja Wahl

It is highly uncertain how the humidity flux between the snow surface and the atmosphere contributes to the surface mass balance (SMB) of the interior Greenland Ice Sheet (GrIS). Due to sparse observations, evaluations of the simulated humidity flux are li ...

Copernicus Gesellschaft Mbh2024

Snowfall deposition in mountainous terrain: a statistical downscaling scheme from high-resolution model data on simulated topographies

Michael Lehning

One of the primary causes of non-uniform snowfall deposition on the ground in mountainous regions is the preferential deposition of snow, which results from the interaction of near-surface winds with topography and snow particles. However, producing high-r ...

Frontiers Media Sa2024

Nanocluster Aerosols from Ozone-Human Chemistry Are Dominated by Squalene-Ozone Reactions

Dusan Licina, Shen Yang

Nanocluster aerosols (NCAs,

Amer Chemical Soc2024

Characteristics and sources of fluorescent aerosols in the central Arctic Ocean

Benjamin Jérémy Laurent Heutte, Julia Schmale, Ivo Fabio Beck, Margarida Teles Nogueira Rolo, Hélène Paule Angot, Oliver Müller, Jakob Boyd Pernov, Nora Bergner, Alireza Moallemi, Markus Frey

The Arctic is sensitive to cloud radiative forcing. Due to the limited number of aerosols present throughout much of the year, cloud formation is susceptible to the presence of cloud condensation nuclei and ice nucleating particles (INPs). Primary biologic ...

2024

A full year of aerosol size distribution data from the central Arctic under an extreme positive Arctic Oscillation: insights from the Multidisciplinary drifting Observatory for the Study of Arctic Climate (MOSAiC) expedition

Benjamin Jérémy Laurent Heutte, Federico Bianchi, Julia Schmale, Ivo Fabio Beck, Lubna Dada, Hélène Paule Angot, Jakob Boyd Pernov

The Arctic environment is rapidly changing due to accelerated warming in the region. The warming trend is driving a decline in sea ice extent, which thereby enhances feedback loops in the surface energy budget in the Arctic. Arctic aerosols play an importa ...

Copernicus Publications2023

RaFSIP: Parameterizing ice multiplication in models using a machine learning approach

Athanasios Nenes, Paraskevi Georgakaki

Accurately representing mixed-phase clouds (MPCs) in global climate models (GCMs) is critical for capturing climate sensitivity and Arctic amplification. Secondary ice production (SIP), can significantly increase ice crystal number concentration (ICNC) in ...

2024

Snow-Atmosphere Humidity Exchange at the Ice Sheet Surface Alters Annual Mean Climate Signals in Ice Core Records

Sonja Wahl

Surface processes alter the water stable isotope signal of the surface snow after deposition. However, it remains an open question to which extent surface post-depositional processes should be considered when inferring past climate information from ice cor ...

Amer Geophysical Union2023

Reducing Aerosol Forcing Uncertainty by Combining Models With Satellite and Within-The-Atmosphere Observations: A Three-Way Street

Athanasios Nenes

Aerosol forcing uncertainty represents the largest climate forcing uncertainty overall. Its magnitude has remained virtually undiminished over the past 20 years despite considerable advances in understanding most of the key contributing elements. Recent wo ...

AMER GEOPHYSICAL UNION2023

Physicochemical characterization and source apportionment of Arctic ice-nucleating particles observed in Ny-Alesund in autumn 2019

Guangyu Li, Athanasios Nenes, Jörg Wieder, Ghislain Gilles Jean-Michel Motos

Ice-nucleating particles (INPs) initiate primary ice formation in Arctic mixed-phase clouds (MPCs), altering cloud radiative properties and modulating precipitation. For atmospheric INPs, the complexity of their spatiotemporal variations, heterogeneous sou ...

Copernicus GmbH2023

Global Mapping of Potential and Climatic Plant‐Available Soil Water

Dani Or, Sara Bonetti

The estimation of plant-available soil water (PASW) is essential to quantify transpiration fluxes, the onset of heatwaves, irrigation water management, land-use decisions, vegetation ecology, and land surface memory in climate models. PASW is the amount of ...

2023

Snow transport in extreme environments: from small to large scale modeling

Daniela Brito Melo

The cold regions on Earth, such as the polar and high mountain regions, are snow covered for at least a part of the year. These snow-covered surfaces are highly dynamic, particularly under the influence of strong winds. The aeolian or wind-driven transport ...

EPFL2023

A multimodel analysis of post-Glasgow climate targets and feasibility challenges

Marc Vielle, Sigit Pria Perdana

The COP26 Glasgow process resulted in many countries strengthening their 2030 emissions reduction targets and announcing net-zero pledges for 2050–2070 but it is not clear how this would impact future warming. Here, we use four diverse integrated assessmen ...

2023

A Case Study on Drivers of the Isotopic Composition of Water Vapor at the Coast of East Antarctica

Michael Lehning, Armin Sigmund, Riqo Chaar

Stable water isotopes (SWIs) contain valuable information on the past climate and phase changes in the hydrologic cycle. Recently, vapor measurements in the polar regions have provided new insights into the effects of snow-related and atmospheric processes ...

AMER GEOPHYSICAL UNION2023

A 2000-year temperature reconstruction on the East Antarctic plateau from argon-nitrogen and water stable isotopes in the Aurora Basin North ice core

Jérôme Chappellaz

The temperature of the Earth is one of the most important climate parameters. Proxy records of past climate changes, in particular temperature, represent a fundamental tool for exploring internal climate processes and natural climate forcings. Despite the ...

COPERNICUS GESELLSCHAFT MBH2023

CRYOWRF—Model Evaluation and the Effect of Blowing Snow on the Antarctic Surface Mass Balance

Michael Lehning, Varun Sharma, Franziska Gerber

The surface mass balance (SMB) of large polar ice sheets and of snow and ice surfaces in general are incompletely understood because of the complexity of processes involved. One such process, drifting and blowing snow, has only been considered in a very si ...

AMER GEOPHYSICAL UNION2023

The role of secondary ice production in mixed-phase clouds

Paraskevi Georgakaki

Clouds are omnipresent in the Earth's atmosphere. Their phase composition significantly modulates their interaction with solar and terrestrial radiation, as well as precipitation formation. Particularly for clouds containing both phases, known as mixed-pha ...

EPFL2023

Role of K-feldspar and quartz in global ice nucleation by mineral dust in mixed-phase clouds

Athanasios Nenes

Ice-nucleating particles (INPs) enable ice formation, profoundly affecting the microphysical and radiative properties, lifetimes, and precipitation rates of clouds. Mineral dust emitted from arid regions, particularly potassium-containing feldspar (K-felds ...

Copernicus GmbH2023