Disposable radiosondes for tracking Lagrangian fluctuations inside warm clouds

Abstract

Clouds are a weak link in modelling atmospheric circulation as they depend on interdisciplinary processes ranging from collisions of micron-sized droplets and particles to airflow dynamics on the kilometre scale. The uncertainty in cloud representation and hence climate modelling and weather prediction justifies the need for more explorative observations. A new way of tracking Lagrangian fluctuations inside warm clouds has been proposed as part of the Horizon 2020 Innovative Training Network ClOud-MicroPhysics- turbuLEnce-TElemetry project. Part of the project aims to design a new kind of ultralight radio probe capable of floating in stratocumuli clouds. The probes presented in this paper will be environmentally friendly and will allow the generation of a Lagrangian database for small-scale fluctuations inside warm clouds