Identification

Title

Interannual, seasonal and regional variations in the Martian convective boundary layer derived from GCM simulations with a semi‐interactive dust transport model

Abstract

We present interannual, seasonal, and regional variations in the daytime Martian convective boundary layer (CBL). Martian CBL meteorology is driven both by the effect of diurnal and seasonal cycles as well as complex Martian topography. One of the most important components of the Martian atmosphere is its dust cycle. Here, we develop a novel semi-interactive dust transport model within the MarsWRF framework, in which the dust is lifted, advected by model winds, mixed, and allowed to sediment, but is then scaled to match two-dimensional maps of the observed daily column-integrated dust opacity. This allows the vertical dust distribution and associated dust radiative heating to be controlled by model processes, while the horizontal dust distribution is constrained to follow observations. We report the impact of the dust cycle on Martian boundary layer meteorology. Enhanced dust transport lowers the global net surface heating rates, decreasing the turbulent mixing in CBL to virtually zero (within the dust storm season) and, enhances the wind shear on average by almost 50%. As a superposition of both impacts, during global dust storms (GDS) in Mars Year (MY) 25 and 34, we find that long-lasting extremely shallow daytime boundary layers can globally form as shallow as 0.5 km (but not for the less intense GDS in MY 28), unlike the 9 km deep and highly turbulent CBL formation at GDS onset and decay. Based on our GCM results, strong CBL suppression lasts as long as approximately 67 and 57 sols during GDS events in MY 25 and 34.

Resource type

document

Resource locator

Unique resource identifier

code

http://n2t.net/ark:/85065/d7d50rd2

codeSpace

Dataset language

eng

Spatial reference system

code identifying the spatial reference system

Classification of spatial data and services

Topic category

geoscientificInformation

Keywords

Keyword set

keyword value

Text

originating controlled vocabulary

title

Resource Type

reference date

date type

publication

effective date

2016-01-01T00:00:00Z

Geographic location

West bounding longitude

East bounding longitude

North bounding latitude

South bounding latitude

Temporal reference

Temporal extent

Begin position

End position

Dataset reference date

date type

publication

effective date

2021-10-01T00:00:00Z

Frequency of update

Quality and validity

Lineage

Conformity

Data format

name of format

version of format

Constraints related to access and use

Constraint set

Use constraints

Limitations on public access

None

Responsible organisations

Responsible party

contact position

OpenSky Support

organisation name

UCAR/NCAR - Library

full postal address

PO Box 3000

Boulder

80307-3000

email address

opensky@ucar.edu

web address

http://opensky.ucar.edu/

name: homepage

responsible party role

pointOfContact

Metadata on metadata

Metadata point of contact