Seminar "Impact of Turbulence on Cloud Microphysics " by Prof. Eberhard Bodenschatz

[Speaker]

Professor Eberhard Bodenschatz

MPI for Dynamics and Self-Organization,

Physics Institute for Dynamics of Complex Systems, U. Goettingen

[Abstract]

Clouds consist of water droplets and ice particles that are dispersed within a highly non-stationary, inhomogeneous, and intermittent turbulent flow. Despite decades of research, a vast community of scientists and considerable measurement infrastructure, insufficient understanding of cloud physics (moist convection and cloud evolution) is a primary source of uncertainty in weather and climate models. Two key factors that can be blamed for the 'cloud challenge' are the enormous scale separations, i.e., the evolution of clouds span a wide range of scales from hundreds of nanometers to hundreds of kilometers, and there is a strong interplay and coupling with turbulence at all scales. A huge challenge is to understand the microphysical processes occurring at sub-meter scales, such as inertial clustering and entrainment of environmental air in clouds. I will formulate the 'cloud challenge' and will show how experiments in the laboratory as well as in the field (Zugspitze, Max Planck CloudKite Laboratory, sea excursions) can help solve this challenge. This work is supported by the Max Planck Gesellschaft, the Bayerische Staatsministerium fuer Umwelt und Verbraucherschutz, the ITN COMPLETE and the Knut and Alice Wallenberg Foundation. This work is conducted in collaboration with Gholamhossein (Mohsen) Bagheri, Guus Bertens, Johannes Guettler , Antonio Ibanez, John Lawson, Jan Molacek, Freja Nordsiek, Oliver Schlenczek.