Welcome to Dr. Weiguang Meng Newest Member o f the IPRC Dynamical Downscal ing Group!

 

From  left  to  right:  Dr.  Weiguang  Meng,  Dr.  Yuqing  Wang,  and  Dr.  Chunxi  Zhang

Dr. Weiguang Meng, a visiting professional colleague (postdoctoral fellow) from the Institute

of Tropical and Marine Meteorology of the China Meteorological Administration in Guangzhou, joined the dynamical downscaling group at the International Pacific Research Center at University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa (IPRC/UHM) on September 9, 2014. He has been working on understanding and modeling fundamental processes related to convective rainstorms associated with organized precipitation systems such as mesoscale convective systems (MCSs), which led to his work improving the warm-season quantitative precipitation forecasts in South China. His research topics include simulations of MCSs developed under various synoptic situations, such as frontal systems, monsoon trough, and tropical cyclones, the mesoscale structure and evolution features of different MCSs and their formation mechanisms, discrepancies between the model simulations and observations, and the main sources of model bias in predicting precipitation.

Dr. Meng’s experience in using the WRF model to address various precipitation processes and the impact of land surface processes on local/regional rainfall fits well with the dynamical downscaling efforts in the IPRC/UHM. He will be working on the projects 21st Century High-Resolution Climate Projections for Guam and American Samoa and Very Fine Resolution Dynamical Downscaling of Past and Future Climates for Assessment of Climate Change Impacts on the Islands of O‘ahu and Kaua‘i, both funded by the PI CSC. He will also be involved in the initial assessment on   the concept of simulation and quantification of wet deposition/cloudwater intercept and associated soil moisture over the Hawaiian Islands.

The image on the following page shows the model output for 21st Century High-Resolution Climate Projections for Guam and American Samoa.

Demonstrations of model output for 21st Century High-Resolution Climate Projections for Guam and American Samoa. The top figure illustrates observed tropical cyclones in the West Pacific in 1990; the lower figure illustrates the WRF (Weather and Forecast model) simulated cyclone tracks for the same time period. The research team builds an earth systems model of the region of interest and then simulates weather patterns for a time period in recent years for which the weather already is documented. The model is adjusted until the simulations are representative of observed patterns.