A numerical case study during ISDAC

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Description

Numerical simulations with a mesoscale meteorological model are compared to ground-based and upper-air sounding observations in Point Barrow, Alaska, as part of the Indirect and Semi-Direct Aerosol Campaign (ISDAC) field campaign. The Weather, Research, and Forecasting (WRF) model is run at varying horizontal resolutions to analyze the importance of local forcing processes such as land surface and topography on the local weather conditions at Point Barrow. The WRF model, initialized with NCEP Global Forecast System (GFS) reanalysis data, is run over a period of several days for selected cases in the winter and spring of 2008. Idealized experiments with WRF and its chemistry module (WRF/Chem) are also run to analyze direct and indirect aerosol forcing effects on the surface radiation budget and meteorological parameters such as temperature and precipitation.