Estimation and characterization of atmospheric turbulence in the free atmosphere above the Tibetan Plateau using the Thorpe method.

Understanding turbulence in the free atmosphere is important for analyzing atmospheric pollution, forecasting weather, and light transmission. In this paper, we have tried to estimate the atmospheric refractive index structure constant 2, the turbulent dissipation rate , and the turbulent diffusion coefficient simultaneously during the experiment time over Lhasa, using the sounding data coupled with the Thorpe method. The result shows that the 2 estimation gives a better performance with the correlation coefficients and the average relative error when compared with 2 estimated by Dewan and HMNSP99.

Model for estimating the astronomical seeing at Dome A, Antarctica.

A model for estimating astronomical seeing at Kunlun Station (Dome A, Antarctica) is proposed. This model is based on the Tatarskii equation, using the wind shear and temperature gradient as inputs, and a seeing model depending directly on the weather data is provided. The seeing and near-ground weather data to build and validate the proposed seeing model were measured at Dome A during the summer of 2019.

Simple method to estimate the optical turbulence over snow and ice.

A simple physics-based method for estimating optical turbulence (2) within the surface layer over snow and ice is proposed, using the Tatarski equation with an improved outer scale model. This improved outer scale model mainly requires the calculation of the wind shear and temperature gradients. Based on the measurements from a mobile polar atmospheric parameter measurement system at the Antarctic Taishan Station in 2014, 2 was estimated using two methods: the Tatarski equation and the Monin-Obukhov similarity (MOS) theory.

Reliable model to estimate the profile of the refractive index structure parameter (C) and integrated astroclimatic parameters in the atmosphere.

Based on the statistical study of meteorological balloons equipped with thermosondes, a new model that estimates the profile of the refractive index structure constant (2) is proposed. Utilizing temperature, pressure, and wind shear as inputs, this new approach can estimate vertical profiles of 2 with 100 m vertical resolution. We used four outer scale models (Thorpe, HMNSP99, Dewan, and our proposed model) on data acquired from Rongcheng (Shandong Peninsula) and Maoming (Guangdong Province) to estimate the 2 profiles and compared the results with the measured 2 profile.

Estimation of behavior of optical turbulence during summer in the surface layer above the Antarctic Plateau using the Polar WRF model.

An optical turbulence ($C_n^2$) was found to be concentrated predominantly in the thin surface layer (SL) above the Antarctic Plateau. We present an estimation of the behavior of the SL $C_n^2$ during the summer time over the entire Antarctic Plateau, using the polar-optimized version of the Weather Research and Forecast model (Polar WRF) coupled with the Monin-Obukhov similarity theory. The results show that the $C_n^2$ is affected by the sunlight direction and terrain height.

New $\text{C}_{n}^{2}$ statistical model based on first radiosonde turbulence observation over Lhasa.

It is worth highlighting that, for the first time to the best of our knowledge, vertical profiles of atmospheric parameters and $C_n^2$ were measured at Lhasa, south of the Tibetan Plateau, using balloon-borne radiosondes. Based on the measurements, two new statistical models (Lhasa HMN and Lhasa Dewan) for estimating turbulence strength are proposed. Attention has been paid to evaluate the reliability of the two models to reconstruct vertical profiles of $C_n^2$ from a statistical perspective.