A Community Laboratory Facility for Exploring and Sensing of Aerosol-Cloud-Drizzle Processes: The Aerosol-Cloud-Drizzle Convection Chamber

Abstract

This proposal is a joint effort—simultaneously submitted to the NSF Division of Atmospheric and Geospace Sciences and the Department of Energy Atmospheric System Research Program—for design of a large-scale Aerosol-Cloud-Drizzle-Convection Chamber (ACDC2) and accompanying instrumentation to explore chemical and physical interactions and evolution of aerosols, cloud droplets, and drizzle within turbulent clouds. The chamber would enable for the first-time the study, under controlled laboratory conditions, of aerosol and cloud processes that underlie some of the largest uncertainties in understanding aerosol-cloud-precipitation interactions. Steady-state clouds would be generated by moist convection, as in the novel Pi Chamber developed with support from the NSF Major Research Instrumentation (MRI) program, but in a much larger chamber that allows for substantial drizzle to be produced through collision and coalescence of cloud droplets. A novel suite of in situ and remote-sensing measurement systems will be designed for high-resolution characterization of aerosol, cloud, and drizzle particle populations within the large chamber. The proposal team assembles the expertise to address the design challenges— including scientific exploration and engineering design to achieve drizzle generation in a large laboratory chamber and for cutting-edge measurement technologies—to create an internationally unique facility.