Publications

Raj, V; Sarthi, PP; Srivastava, AK (2024). Impact of Types of Aerosol and Meteorological Conditions on Rain Rate Over India. PURE AND APPLIED GEOPHYSICS, 181(2), 611-623.

Abstract
The current study investigates the relationship among Aerosol Optical Depth (AOD), rain rate in aerosol types (fine-mode and coarse-mode), and meteorological conditions (such as relative humidity and vertical velocity) during Indian Summer Monsoon (ISM) over regions of the Gangetic plain (GP) and the Modified Core Monsoon Region (MCMR) of India. The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) aerosol products, including AOD and Angstrom Exponent (AE), the observed rainfall gridded data of India Meteorological Department (IMD) and reanalyzed data of relative humidity (RH), vertical velocity (VV) and wind speed and direction as meteorological variables from European Center for Medium Range Weather Forecasting (ECMWF) Reanalysis v5 (ERA5) are used for the period of 2003-2021. It is noticed that regions of GP and MCMR experienced significant rainfall suppression with increasing aerosol loading in moderately polluted condition and beyond moderately polluted condition, the different rain rate responses to aerosol loading is observed. Different aerosol types and meteorological conditions may have different influences on the AOD-rain rate relationship. It is found that an increase in AOD may suppress or enhance the rain rate in a region like GP where high RH condition prevails, as well as the presence of fine-mode aerosol can enhance the rain rate in a highly polluted condition (AOD >= 0.4). An increase in AOD may enhance the rain rate in conditions of high and low RH over the regions. In high and low updraft conditions, an increase in AOD suppresses the rain rate. Additionally, high (low) RH and high (low) updraft promote high (low) rain rate over the regions.

DOI:
10.1007/s00024-023-03393-w

ISSN:
0033-4553