Observational Study of Cloud Microphysical Characteristics of Tropical Cyclones in Different Environmental Fields Using Multi-Source Satellite Data

In this study, a variety of high-resolution satellite data were used to analyze the similarities and differences in horizontal and vertical cloud microphysical characteristics of 11 tropical cyclones (TCs) in three different ocean basins. The results show that for the 11 TCs in different ocean basins, no matter in what season the TCs were generated when they reached or approached Category 4, their melting layers were all distributed in the vertical direction at the height of about 5 km. The high value of ice water contents in the vertical direction of 11 TCs all reach or approach about 2000 g cm^–3.The total attenuated scattering coefficient at 532 nm, TAB-532, can successfully characterize the distribution of areas with high ice water content when the vertical distribution was concentrated near 0.1 km^–1 sr^–1, possibly because the diameter distribution of the corresponding range of aerosol particles had a more favorable effect on the formation of ice nuclei, indicating that aerosols had a significant impact on the ice-phase processes and characteristics. Moreover, by analyzing the horizontal cloud water content, the distribution analysis of cloud water path (CWP) and ice water path (IWP) shows that when the sea surface temperature was at a relatively high value, and the vertical wind shear was relatively small, the CWP and the IWP can reach a relatively high value, which also proves the importance of environmental field factors on the influence of TC cloud microphysical characteristics.