Abstract

Sand and dust storm in East Asia, so called Asian dust, is a seasonal meteorological phenomenon. Mostly in spring, dust particles blown into atmosphere in the arid area over northern China desert and Manchuria are transported to East Asia by prevailing flows. An Asian dust event occurred on 6-8 May 2007 is chosen to investigate how sensitive the Asian dust transport forecast to the initial condition uncertainties and to interpret the characteristics of sensitivity structures from the viewpoint of dynamics and predictability. To investigate the forecast sensitivities to the initial condition, adjoint sensitivities that calculate gradient of the forecast aspect (i.e., response function) with respect to the initial condition are used. The forecast aspects relevant to Asian dust transports are dry energy forecast error and lower tropospheric pressure forecast error. The results show that the sensitive regions for the dry energy forecast error and the lower tropospheric pressure forecast error are initially located in the vicinity of the trough and then propagate eastward as the surface low system moves eastward. The vertical structures of the adjoint sensitivities for the dry energy forecast error are upshear tilted structures, which are typical adjoint sensitivity structures for extratropical cyclones. Energy distribution of singular vectors also show very similar structures with the adjoint sensitivities for the dry energy forecast error. The adjoint sensitivities of the lower tropospheric pressure forecast error with respect to the relative vorticity show that the accurate forecast of the trough (or relative vorticity) location and intensity is essential to have better forecasts of the Asian dust event. Forecast error for the atmospheric circulation during the dust event is reduced 62.8% by extracting properly weighted adjoint sensitivity perturbations from the initial state. Linearity assumption holds generally well for this case. Dynamics of the Asian dust transport is closely associated with predictability of it, and the improvement in the overall forecast by the adjoint sensitivity perturbations implies that adjoint sensitivities would be beneficial in improving the forecast of Asian dust events.

Keywords

• Adjoint sensitivity;
• Asian dust forecast;
• Forecast sensitivity;
• Energy forecast error;
• Lower tropospheric pressure forecast error;
• Relative vorticity