Field of Study

Within my PhD project I would like to investigate which effects control the cloudiness in the trade wind regions, posing the question: What are the principle meteorological controls on cloud amount?

In particular I will focus on the structure and organization of those clouds, rather than their microphysical properties. Within our initiative "The Barbados Cloud Observatory" in Barbados a cloud radar is scanning a region above the sea at the east coast of the island (Deebles Point). Various scanning angles will allow us to investigate different patterns/formations and the temporal behavior of shallow cumuli clouds from different perspectives. To complement this work I would like to use high-resolution satellite retrievals for different seasons near the island of Barbados to study the same region, where our field campaign is located.