Chandrakar et al. (2025) Dampening of the Precipitation Response to Aerosol Pollution From Turbulence in Cumulus Clouds

⚠️ Warning: This summary was generated from the abstract only, as the full text was not available.

Identification

• Journal: Geophysical Research Letters
• Year: 2025
• Date: 2025-12-05
• Authors: Kamal Kant Chandrakar, Hugh Morrison
• DOI: 10.1029/2025gl118693

Research Groups

Not available from the abstract.

Short Summary

This study, using aircraft observations and a cloud model, demonstrates that turbulence-enhanced drop collision-coalescence in warm cumulus clouds not only accelerates rain onset but also significantly dampens precipitation susceptibility to aerosol loading, a critical finding for Earth system models.

Objective

• To demonstrate that turbulence-enhanced drop collision-coalescence in warm cumulus clouds leads to earlier rain onset and significantly dampens the precipitation susceptibility to aerosol loading, contrasting with models that neglect turbulent effects.

Study Configuration

• Spatial Scale: Cloud scale (warm cumulus clouds)
• Temporal Scale: Processes leading to rain onset and cloud development

Methodology and Data

• Models used: Cloud model with particle-based microphysics
• Data sources: Aircraft observations

Main Results

• Turbulence-enhanced drop collision-coalescence leads to an earlier onset of rain in warm cumulus clouds.
• It significantly dampens the precipitation susceptibility to aerosol loading.
• Enhanced turbulent coalescence substantially increases the production of drizzle embryos just above cloud base.
• These drizzle embryos accelerate rain drop growth at mid and upper cloud levels, even under highly polluted conditions.
• In contrast, when turbulent coalescence is neglected (using a gravitational-only collision kernel), pollution aerosols strongly inhibit rainfall.
• The effects of turbulent coalescence strongly influence the response of warm cumulus clouds and precipitation to aerosol loading.

Contributions

• Provides evidence that turbulence-enhanced drop coalescence plays a critical role in modulating aerosol-cloud-precipitation interactions.
• Highlights the necessity of including turbulent coalescence effects in Earth system model representations for accurate simulation of aerosol indirect radiative forcing.

Funding

Not available from the abstract.

Citation

@article{Chandrakar2025Dampening,
  author = {Chandrakar, Kamal Kant and Morrison, Hugh},
  title = {Dampening of the Precipitation Response to Aerosol Pollution From Turbulence in Cumulus Clouds},
  journal = {Geophysical Research Letters},
  year = {2025},
  doi = {10.1029/2025gl118693},
  url = {https://doi.org/10.1029/2025gl118693}
}