Influence of Below-Cloud Evaporation on Deuterium Excess in Precipitation of Arid Central Asia and Its Meteorological Controls

The deuterium excess is a second-order parameter linking water-stable oxygen and hydrogen isotopes and has been widely used in hydrological studies. The deuterium excess in precipitation is greatly influenced by below-cloud evaporation through unsaturated air, especially in an arid climate. Based on...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of hydrometeorology 2016-07, Vol.17 (7), p.1973-1984
Main Authors: Wang, Shengjie, Zhang, Mingjun, Che, Yanjun, Zhu, Xiaofan, Liu, Xuemei
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Air temperature
Arid climates
Aridity
Climate
Climatic analysis
Clouds
Deuterium
Environmental science
Evaporation
Heavy precipitation
Heavy rainfall
High density polyethylenes
High humidity
High temperature
Hydrogen
Hydrogen isotopes
Hydrologic studies
Hydrology
Isotopes
Low humidity
Low temperature
Mountains
Order parameters
Oxygen
Polyethylene
Precipitation
Raindrops
Regression analysis
Relative humidity
Sensitivity analysis
Slopes
Studies
Temperature effects
Water temperature
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Summary:The deuterium excess is a second-order parameter linking water-stable oxygen and hydrogen isotopes and has been widely used in hydrological studies. The deuterium excess in precipitation is greatly influenced by below-cloud evaporation through unsaturated air, especially in an arid climate. Based on an observation network of isotopes in precipitation of arid central Asia, the difference in deuterium excess from cloud base to ground was calculated for each sampling site. The difference on the southern slope of the Tian Shan is generally larger than that on the northern slope, and the difference during the summer months is greater than that during the winter months. Generally, an increase of 1% in evaporation of raindrops causes deuterium excess to decrease by approximately 1‰. Under conditions of low air temperature, high relative humidity, heavy precipitation, and large raindrop diameter, a good linear correlation is exhibited between evaporation proportion and difference in deuterium excess, and a linear regression slope of
ISSN:1525-755X
1525-7541
DOI:10.1175/jhm-d-15-0203.1