Ingredients-based Methodology and Fuzzy Logic Combined Short-Duration Heavy Rainfall Short-Range Forecasting:An Improved Scheme

Short-duration heavy rainfall(SHR),as delineated by the National Meteorological Center of the China Me-teorological Administration,is characterized by hourly rainfall amounts no less than 20.0 mm.SHR is one of the most common convective weather phenomena that can cause severe damage.Short-range forecasting of SHR is an important part of operational severe weather prediction.In the present study,an improved objective SHR forecasting scheme was developed by adopting the ingredients-based methodology and using the fuzzy logic approach.The 1.0°×1.0°National Centers for Environmental Prediction(NCEP)final analysis data and the ordinary rainfall(0.1-19.9 mm h-1)and SHR observational data from 411 stations were used in the improved scheme.The best lifted index,the total precipitable water,the 925 hPa specific humidity(Q 925),and the 925 hPa divergence(DIV 925)were selected as predictors based on objective analysis.Continuously distributed membership functions of predictors were obtained based on relative frequency analysis.The weights of predictors were also objectively determined.Experiments with a typhoon SHR case and a spring SHR case show that the main possible areas could be captured by the improved scheme.Verification of SHR forecasts within 96 hours with NCEP global forecasts 1.0°×1.0°data initiated at 08:00 Beijing Time during the warm seasons in 2015 show the results were improved from both deterministic and probabilistic perspectives.This study provides an objectively feasible choice for short-range guidance forecasts of SHR.The scheme can be applied to other convective phenomena.

APPLICATION EXPERIMENT OF ASSIMILATING RADAR-RETRIEVED WATER VAPOR IN SHORT-RANGE FORECAST OF RAINFALL IN THE ANNUALLY FIRST RAINY SEASON OVER SOUTH CHINA

A scheme of assimilating radar-retrieved water vapor is adopted to improve the quality of NWP initial field for improvement of the accuracy of short-range precipitation prediction. To reveal the impact of the assimilation of radar-retrieved water vapor on short-term precipitation forecast, three parallel experiments, cold start, hot start and hot start plus the assimilation of radar-retrieved water vapor, are designed to simulate the 31 days of May, 2013 with a fine numerical model for South China. Furthermore, a case of heavy rain that occurred from 8-9 May 2013 over the region from the southwest of Guangdong province to Pearl River Delta is analyzed in detail. Results show that the cold start experiment is not conducive to precipitation 12 hours ahead; the hot start experiment is able to reproduce well the first6 hours of precipitation, but badly for subsequent prediction; the experiment of assimilating radar-retrieved water vapor is not only able to simulate well the precipitation 6 hours ahead, but also able to correctly predict the evolution of rain bands from 6 to 12 hours in advance.

Improving the Short-Range Precipitation Forecast of Numerical Weather Prediction through a Deep Learning-Based Mask Approach

Due to various technical issues,existing numerical weather prediction(NWP)models often perform poorly at forecasting rainfall in the first several hours.To correct the bias of an NWP model and improve the accuracy of short-range precipitation forecasting,we propose a deep learning-based approach called UNet Mask,which combines NWP forecasts with the output of a convolutional neural network called UNet.The UNet Mask involves training the UNet on historical data from the NWP model and gridded rainfall observations for 6-hour precipitation forecasting.The overlap of the UNet output and the NWP forecasts at the same rainfall threshold yields a mask.The UNet Mask blends the UNet output and the NWP forecasts by taking the maximum between them and passing through the mask,which provides the corrected 6-hour rainfall forecasts.We evaluated UNet Mask on a test set and in real-time verification.The results showed that UNet Mask outperforms the NWP model in 6-hour precipitation prediction by reducing the FAR and improving CSI scores.Sensitivity tests also showed that different small rainfall thresholds applied to the UNet and the NWP model have different effects on UNet Mask's forecast performance.This study shows that UNet Mask is a promising approach for improving rainfall forecasting of NWP models.

Bias-Corrected Short-Range Ensemble Forecasts for Near-Surface Variables during the Summer Season of 2010 in Northern China

A running mean bias （RMB） correction ap- proach was applied to the forecasts of near-surface variables in a seasonal short-range ensemble forecasting experiment with 57 consecutive cases during summer 2010 in the northern China region. To determine a proper training window length for calculating RMB, window lengths from 2 to 20 days were evaluated, and 16 days was taken as an optimal window length, since it receives most of the benefit from extending the window length. The raw and 16-day RMB corrected ensembles were then evaluated for their ensemble mean forecast skills. The results show that the raw ensemble has obvious bias in all near-surface variables. The RMB correction can remove the bias reasonably well, and generate an unbiased ensemble. The bias correction not only reduces the ensemble mean forecast error, but also results in a better spreaderror relationship. Moreover, two methods for computing calibrated probabilistic forecast （PF） were also evaluated through the 57 case dates： 1） using the relative frequency from the RMB-eorrected ensemble; 2） computing the forecasting probabilities based on a historical rank histogram. The first method outperforms the second one, as it can improve both the reliability and the resolution of the PFs, while the second method only has a small effect on the reliability, indicating the necessity and importance of removing the systematic errors from the ensemble.

Sensitivity to Tendency Perturbations of Tropical Cyclone Short-range Intensity Forecasts Generated by WRF

The present study uses the nonlinear singular vector(NFSV)approach to identify the optimally-growing tendency perturbations of the Weather Research and Forecasting(WRF)model for tropical cyclone(TC)intensity forecasts.For nine selected TC cases,the NFSV-tendency perturbations of the WRF model,including components of potential temperature and/or moisture,are calculated when TC intensities are forecasted with a 24-hour lead time,and their respective potential temperature components are demonstrated to have more impact on the TC intensity forecasts.The perturbations coherently show barotropic structure around the central location of the TCs at the 24-hour lead time,and their dominant energies concentrate in the middle layers of the atmosphere.Moreover,such structures do not depend on TC intensities and subsequent development of the TC.The NFSV-tendency perturbations may indicate that the model uncertainty that is represented by tendency perturbations but associated with the inner-core of TCs,makes larger contributions to the TC intensity forecast uncertainty.Further analysis shows that the TC intensity forecast skill could be greatly improved as preferentially superimposing an appropriate tendency perturbation associated with the sensitivity of NFSVs to correct the model,even if using a WRF with coarse resolution.

A Short-Range Quantitative Precipitation Forecast Algorithm Using Back-Propagation Neural Network Approach

A back-propagation neural network （BPNN） was used to establish relationships between the shortrange （0-3-h） rainfall and the predictors ranging from extrapolative forecasts of radar reflectivity, satelliteestimated cloud-top temperature, lightning strike rates, and Nested Grid Model （NGM） outputs. Quan- titative precipitation forecasts （QPF） and the probabilities of categorical precipitation were obtained. Results of the BPNN algorithm were compared to the results obtained from the multiple linear regression algorithm for an independent dataset from the 1999 warm season over the continental United States. A sample forecast was made over the southeastern United States. Results showed that the BPNN categorical rainfall forecasts agreed well with Stage Ⅲ observations in terms of the size and shape of the area of rainfall. The BPNN tended to over-forecast the spatial extent of heavier rainfall amounts, but the positioning of the areas with rainfall ≥25.4 mm was still generally accurate. It appeared that the BPNN and linear regression approaches produce forecasts of very similar quality, although in some respects BPNN slightly outperformed the regression.

An Implementation of Full Cycle Strategy Using Dynamic Blending for Rapid Refresh Short-range Weather Forecasting in China

The partial cycle(PC)strategy has been used in many rapid refresh cycle systems(RRC)for regional short-range weather forecasting.Since the strategy periodically reinitializes the regional model(RM)from the global model(GM)forecasts to correct the large-scale drift,it has replaced the traditional full cycle(FC)strategy in many RRC systems.However,the extra spin-up in the PC strategy increases the computer burden on RRC and generates discontinuous smallscale systems among cycles.This study returns to the FC strategy but with initial fields generated by dynamic blending(DB)and data assimilation(DA).The DB ingests the time-varied large-scale information from the GM to the RM to generate less-biased background fields.Then the DA is performed.We applied the new FC strategy in a series of 7-day batch forecasts with the 3-hour cycle in July 2018,and February,April,and October 2019 over China using a Weather Research and Forecast(WRF)model-based RRC.A comparison shows that the new FC strategy results in less model bias than the PC strategy in most state variables and improves the forecast skills for moderate and light precipitation.The new FC strategy also allows the model to reach a balanced state earlier and gives favorable forecast continuity between adjacent cycles.Hence,this new FC strategy has potential to be applied in RRC forecast systems to replace the currently used PC strategy.

A Case Study of Impact of FY-2C Satellite Data in Cloud Analysis to Improve Short-Range Precipitation Forecast

Chinese FengYun-2C(FY-2C) satellite data were combined into the Local Analysis and Prediction System(LAPS) model to obtain three-dimensional cloud parameters and rain content. These parameters analyzed by LAPS were used to initialize the Global/Regional Assimilation and Prediction System model(GRAPES) in China to predict precipitation in a rainstorm case in the country. Three prediction experiments were conducted and were used to investigate the impacts of FY-2C satellite data on cloud analysis of LAPS and on short range precipitation forecasts. In the first experiment, the initial cloud fields was zero value. In the second, the initial cloud fields were cloud liquid water, cloud ice, and rain content derived from LAPS without combining the satellite data. In the third experiment, the initial cloud fields were cloud liquid water, cloud ice, and rain content derived from LAPS including satellite data. The results indicated that the FY-2C satellite data combination in LAPS can show more realistic cloud distributions, and the model simulation for precipitation in 1–6 h had certain improvements over that when satellite data and complex cloud analysis were not applied.

Comparison of Microwave Imaging Algorithms for Short-Range Scenarios

Three dimensional(3-D)imaging algorithms with irregular planar multiple-input-multiple-output(MIMO)arrays are discussed and compared with each other.Based on the same MIMO array,a modified back projection algorithm(MBPA)is accordingly proposed and four imaging algorithms are used for comparison,back-projection method(BP),back-projection one in time domain(BP-TD),modified back-projection one and fast Fourier transform(FFT)-based MIMO range migration algorithm(FFT-based MIMO RMA).All of the algorithms have been implemented in practical application scenarios by use of the proposed imaging system.Back to the practical applications,MIMO array-based imaging system with wide-bandwidth properties provides an efficient tool to detect objects hidden behind a wall.An MIMO imaging radar system,composed of a vector network analyzer(VNA),a set of switches,and an array of Vivaldi antennas,have been designed,fabricated,and tested.Then,these algorithms have been applied to measured data collected in different scenarios constituted by five metallic spheres in the absence and in the presence of a wall between the antennas and the targets in simulation and pliers in free space for experimental test.Finally,the focusing properties and time consumption of the above algorithms are compared.

Impact of Soil Moisture Uncertainty on Summertime Short-range Ensemble Forecasts

To investigate the impact of soil moisture uncertainty on summertime short-range ensemble forecasts（SREFs）, a fivemember SREF experiment with perturbed initial soil moisture（ISM） was performed over a northern China domain in summertime from July to August 2014. Five soil moisture analyses from three different operational/research centers were used as the ISM for the ensemble. The ISM perturbation produced notable ensemble spread in near-surface variables and atmospheric variables below 800 h Pa, and produced skillful ensemble-mean 24-h accumulated precipitation（APCP24） forecasts that outperformed any single ensemble member. Compared with a second SREF experiment with mixed microphysics parameterization options, the ISM-perturbed ensemble produced comparable ensemble spread in APCP24 forecasts, and had better Brier scores and resolution in probabilistic APCP24 forecasts for 10-mm, 25-mm and 50-mm thresholds. The ISM-perturbed ensemble produced obviously larger ensemble spread in near-surface variables. It was, however, still under-dispersed, indicating that perturbing ISM alone may not be adequate in representing all the uncertainty at the near-surface level, indicating further SREF studies are needed to better represent the uncertainties in land surface processes and their coupling with the atmosphere.

Comparison of different land-surface perturbation methods in short-range ensemble forecasts

In order to compare the sensitivity of short-range ensemble forecasts to different land-surface parameters in the South China region,three perturbation experiments related to the land surface model(LSM),initial soil moisture(ISM),and land–atmosphere coupling coefficient(LCC)were designed,and another control experiment driven by the Global Ensemble Forecast System(GEFS)was also performed.All ensemble members were initiated at 0000 UTC each day,and integrated for 24 h for a total of 40 days from the period 1 April to 10 May 2019 based on the Weather Research and Forecasting model.The results showed that the perturbation experiment of the LSM(LSMPE)had the largest ensemble spread,as well as the lowest ensemble-mean root-mean-square error among the three sets of land-surface perturbed experiments,which indicated that it could represent more uncertainty and less error.The ensemble spread of the perturbation experiment of the ISM(ISMPE)was generally less than that of LSMPE but greater than that of LCCPE(the perturbation experiment of the LCC).In particular,although the perturbation of the LCC could not produce greater spread,it had an effective influence on the intensity of precipitation.However,the ensemble spread of all the land-surface perturbed experiments was smaller than that of GEFSPE(the control experiment).Therefore,in future,land-surface perturbations and atmospheric perturbations should be combined in the design of ensemble forecasting systems to make the model represent more uncertainties.

Study on short-range numerical forecasting of ocean current in the East China Sea——Ⅰ Basic problems of ocean current forecasting and structure of the models

Ocean current forecasting is still in explorative stage of study. In the study, we face some problems that have not been met before. The solving of these problems has become fundamental premise for realizing the ocean current forecasting. In the present paper are discussed in depth the physical essence for such basic problems as the predictability of ocean current, the predictable currents, the dynamical basis for studying respectively the tidal current and circulation, the necessity of boundary model, the models on regions with different scales and their link. The foundations and plans to solve the problems are demonstrated. Finally a set of operational numerical forecasting system for ocean current is proposed.

Effects of short-range attraction on Jamming transition

Enormous progresses to understand the jamming transition have been driven via simulating purely repulsive particles which were somehow idealized in the past two decades. While the attractive systems are both theoretical and practical compared with repulsive systems. By studying the statistics of rigid clusters, we find that the critical packing fraction φ_(c) varies linearly with attraction μ for different system sizes when the range of attraction is short. While for systems with long-range attractions, however, the slope of φ_(c) appears significantly different, which means that there are two distinct jamming scenarios. In this paper, we focus our main attention on short-range attractions scenario and define a new quantity named "short-range attraction susceptibility" χ_(p), which describes the degree of response of the probability of finding jammed states pjto short-range attraction strength μ. Our central results are that χ_(p) diverges in the thermodynamic limit as χ_(p) ∝|φ-φ_(c)^(∞)|^(-γ_(p)), where φ_(c)^(∞) is the packing fraction at the jamming transition for the infinite system in the absence of attraction. χ_(p) obeys scaling collapse with a scaling function in both two and three dimensions, illuminating that the jamming transition can be considered as a phase transition as proposed in previous work.

Temporal-spatial Distribution and Short-range Prediction Indicators of Hail Weather in East Central Haixi Prefecture of Qinghai Province

[ Objective] The study aimed to discuss the temporal-spatial distribution and short-range prediction indicators of hail weather in east central Haixi Prefecture of Qinghai Province. [Method] Using hail data of six stations in east central Haixi Prefecture from 1960 to 2010, the temporal and spatial distribution of hail weather was analyzed firstly. Afterwards, based on the high-altitude factual data of 30 case studies of hail during 2006 -2010, its high-altitude and ground weather situation and physical quantity field were studied to summarize short-term circulation pattern and shod- range prediction characteristics of hail weather. [ Result] In east central Haixi, hail appeared from April to September, and it was most frequently from May to August. Meanwhile, hail was frequent from 14：00 to 20：00. Among the six stations, hail was most frequent in Tianjun but least frequent in Wulan. Moreover, hail disaster mainly occurred in Wulan and Tianjun. In addition, there were three typos of circulation pattern of hail weather at 500 hPa. Hail mainly occurred under the effect of northwest airflow, and it had shortwave trough, cold center or trough, jet stream core or one of the three. Hail appeared frequently under the situation of upper-level divergence and low-level convergence, and abundant water vapor and water vapor flux convergence at low levels were important conditions for hailing. [ Conclusion] The research could provide scientific references for improving the accuracy of hail forecast.

Short-range clutter suppression method combining oblique projection and interpolation in airborne CFA radar

The airborne conformal array(CFA)radar's clutter ridges are range-modulated,which result in a bias in the estimation of the clutter covariance matrix(CCM)of the cell under test(CUT),further,reducing the clutter suppression performance of the airborne CFA radar.The clutter ridges can be effectively compensated by the space-time separation interpolation(STSINT)method,which costs less computation than the space-time interpolation(STINT)method,but the performance of interpolation algorithms is seriously affected by the short-range clutter,especially near the platform height.Location distributions of CFA are free,which yields serious impact that range spaces of steering vector matrices are non-orthogonal complement and even no longer disjoint.Further,a new method is proposed that the shortrange clutter is pre-processed by oblique projection with the intersected range spaces(OPIRS),and then clutter data after being pre-processed are compensated to the desired range bin through the STSINT method.The OPIRS also has good compatibility and can be used in combination with many existing methods.At the same time,oblique projectors of OPIRS can be obtained in advance,so the proposed method has almost the same computational load as the traditional compensation method.In addition,the proposed method can perform well when the channel error exists.Computer simulation results verify the effectiveness of the proposed method.

Energy Spectrum for a Short-Range 1/r Singular Potential with a Non-Orbital Barrier Using the Asymptotic Iteration Method

Using the asymptotic iteration method, we obtain the S-wave solution for a short-range three-parameter central potential with 1/r singularity and with a non-orbital barrier. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first attempt at calculating the energy spectrum for this potential, which was introduced by H. Bahlouli and A. D. Alhaidari and for which they obtained the “potential parameter spectrum”. Our results are also independently verified using a direct method of diagonalizing the Hamiltonian matrix in the J-matrix basis.

Non-crossing Quantile Regression Neural Network as a Calibration Tool for Ensemble Weather Forecasts

Despite the maturity of ensemble numerical weather prediction(NWP),the resulting forecasts are still,more often than not,under-dispersed.As such,forecast calibration tools have become popular.Among those tools,quantile regression(QR)is highly competitive in terms of both flexibility and predictive performance.Nevertheless,a long-standing problem of QR is quantile crossing,which greatly limits the interpretability of QR-calibrated forecasts.On this point,this study proposes a non-crossing quantile regression neural network(NCQRNN),for calibrating ensemble NWP forecasts into a set of reliable quantile forecasts without crossing.The overarching design principle of NCQRNN is to add on top of the conventional QRNN structure another hidden layer,which imposes a non-decreasing mapping between the combined output from nodes of the last hidden layer to the nodes of the output layer,through a triangular weight matrix with positive entries.The empirical part of the work considers a solar irradiance case study,in which four years of ensemble irradiance forecasts at seven locations,issued by the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts,are calibrated via NCQRNN,as well as via an eclectic mix of benchmarking models,ranging from the naïve climatology to the state-of-the-art deep-learning and other non-crossing models.Formal and stringent forecast verification suggests that the forecasts post-processed via NCQRNN attain the maximum sharpness subject to calibration,amongst all competitors.Furthermore,the proposed conception to resolve quantile crossing is remarkably simple yet general,and thus has broad applicability as it can be integrated with many shallow-and deep-learning-based neural networks.

Numerical Simulation of Regional Short-Range Climate Anomalies

With the high-speed development of numerical weather prediction, since the later 1980's, the prediction of short-range climate anomalies has attracted worldwide meteorologists' attention . What the so called short-range refers to the time scale from one month to one season or more. In dealing with the problem of short-range climate prediction, two points are needed noticing: one is the basic research to explore or investigate the mechanism of variability of the slow varying components which mainly include internal dynamics of extratropics, external forcings and tropical dynamics, and the other is the modeling efforts to simulate the process of the long-term evolution of the signal which include the improvement of model quality, stochastic prediction and the air-sea-coupled model (Miyakoda et al.,1986). Previous researches on the numerical prediction of short-term climate anomalies are mostly concentrated in the analysis of variables with global spatial scale, especially the global general atmospheric circulation analysis.As to the simulation or prediction of regional short-term climate anomalies, there exist many difficulties and problems. Though some meteorologists are devoting themself to this field, up to now, they have not reached satisfactory results. As a primary effort, by using the 2-level general atmospheric circulation model developed in the Institute of Atmospheric Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences (IAP-AGCM) (Zeng et al., 1989), and taking the year of 1985 as a case, a numerical simulation of regional short-term climate change is completed. We pay high attention to the predictant of anomalous summer rainfall in the Yangtze River and Yellow River valleys, especially its month to month variation.

Generalization properties of restricted Boltzmann machine for short-range order

A biased sampling algorithm for the restricted Boltzmann machine(RBM) is proposed, which allows generating configurations with a conserved quantity. To validate the method, a study of the short-range order in binary alloys with positive and negative exchange interactions is carried out. The network is trained on the data collected by Monte–Carlo simulations for a simple Ising-like binary alloy model and used to calculate the Warren–Cowley short-range order parameter and other thermodynamic properties. We demonstrate that the proposed method allows us not only to correctly reproduce the order parameters for the alloy concentration at which the network was trained, but can also predict them for any other concentrations.

Short-ranged potential effects on the recurrence spectra of lithium M=1 atoms in parallel electric and magnetic fields

This paper presents recurrence spectra of highly excited lithium atoms with M = 1 state in parallel electric and magnetic fields at a fixed scaled energy ε = -0.03. Short-ranged potentials including ionic core potential and centrifugal barrier are taken into account. Their effects on the states and photo-absorption spectrum are analysed in detail. This demonstrates that the geometric features of classical orbits are of special importance for modulations of the spectral pattern. Thus the weak polarization as well as the reduction of correlation of electrons induced by short-ranged potentials give rise to the recurrence spectra of lithium M = 1 atoms more compact than that of the M = 0 one, which is in good agreement with the experimental prediction.