卫星遥感降水潜热的查表法和物理反演法简介

Review of satellite retrieval of latent heating released from precipitation by Look-Up Table and physical retrieval methods

降水所释放的潜热是驱动全球大气环流主要的能量来源,是太阳能向大气热动力能转化的重要途径。准确测量降水云中各高度层的潜热释放率是人类长期努力而未实现的目标。本文阐述了降水潜热在气候系统水循环和能量平衡中的重要意义,以及已有的对热带降水潜热垂直结构的理解和共识,并介绍了遥感降水及其潜热三维结构的主要卫星计划和传感器。特别分析了卫星遥感降水潜热的两大类方法,即查表法和物理反演法。对美国宇航局的CSH算法、日本空间局的SLH算法以及中国科学技术大学的VPH算法的原理做了较为详细的介绍,着重分析了不同算法的思路、特点、适用性和不确定性。

Latent heat(LH)released from precipitation is the primary energy source for driving global atmospheric circulation.It is one of the most important pathways of transforming solar energy to atmospheric thermal energy and kinetic energy.Quantitative estimation of the latent heating rate in precipitating clouds at multiple altitudes is a long demanding but unreached goal for the scientific community.In this review paper,we introduced the important role of LH played in water cycle and energy balance in the Earth’s climate system.The current under⁃standing and agreements on the vertical structure of LH released from tropical precipitation are explained.We introduced the major opera⁃tional and planed satellite platforms and associated sensors aiming for measuring the three dimensional structure of precipitation and LH.Par⁃ticularly,we introduced the two types of satellite retrievals of LH:the Look-Up Table method and physical retrieval method.Relatively de⁃tailed discussions revolve around the NASA CSH algorithm,JAXA SLH algorithm and USTC VPH algorithm,including their advantages,ap⁃plicabilities and uncertainties.