HAR Research
The high-altitude radar group focuses on three main areas of atmospheric research: hurricanes, precipitation and clouds. The data collected in field campaigns from these areas are used in algorithms to retrieve important geophysical variables such as winds, latent heat, precipitation and cloud variables. These data and retrievals allow for a detailed understanding of the dynamics of these phenomena with implications for the numerical modeling of weather and climate.
Hurricane Research
In the figure below, preliminary retrievals of the horizontal wind vector at 3 km height in Tropical Storm Matthew (2010) on September 24th reveal a partial eyewall built by deep convective towers in the down-shear portion of the storm. The colors show Ku-band reflectivity (dBZ) and the arrows reveal the flow structure in the storm. The analysis has a grid spacing of 1 km and is referenced to the National Hurricane Center's estimate of the center of Matthew at 0600 UTC, which is well to the east of the circulation defined by HIWRAP (shown by the "X").
Links to additional HAR work on hurricanes:
Precipitation Research
Understanding GPM precipitation retrievals with HIWRAP