Model description

The Regional Atmospheric Modeling System (RAMS) is a multi-purpose modeling system that has been used to simulate drizzle production in marine stratocumulus [Feingold et al., 1996a; Stevens et al., 1998] and Arctic boundary-layer stratus [Olsson et al., 1998; Harrington et al., 1999]. In this investigation RAMS is set up as a non-hydrostatic LES model combined with an explicit microphysics model [Feingold et al., 1994]. The predicted variables include the three velocity components (u, v, w), the Exner function ($\pi$), the ice-liquid water potential temperature ( $\theta_{il}$) [Tripoli and Cotton, 1981], and total water mixing ratio r_t on a vertically stretched Arakawa C-grid.