Seasonal Variability of Storm Top Altitudes in the Tropics and Subtropics Observed by TRMM PR

• We examine the seasonal variation of storm top altitude over Tropics and Subtropics.
• We explore the precipitation profiles with different storm top altitudes.
• We quantify the relationship between mean top altitudes and mean rain rates.
• Quadratic regression between mean top altitude and rain rate is established.

Seasonal variability of storm top altitudes for convective and stratiform precipitation in the tropics and subtropics are investigated based on measurements of the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) Precipitation Radar (PR) from 1998 to 2011. Statistically, the spatial distribution of mean convective storm top altitudes shows a large variation between land and ocean, while the stratiform storm tops exhibit insignificant land-ocean differences. Seasonal variances of tropical convective and stratiform storm top altitudes are small, with their means are approximately at 5 km (6 km) and 5.5 km (6 km) over the ocean (land) in each season. In the subtropics, the difference of the storm top altitudes between summer and winter reaches ~ 4 km and ~ 2 km for convective and stratiform precipitation, respectively. The zonal mean storm top altitudes of stratiform precipitation are highly correlated with the zonal averaged air temperature and sea surface temperature. Additionally, the mean storm tops of higher altitudes correspond with larger mean rain rates for both convective and stratiform precipitation at the seasonal scale. Such relationship satisfies the quadratic functions with a correlation coefficient of 0.9. On the basis of this relationship, the summer mean rain rates are retrieved from storm top altitudes, which are 1-3 mm/h and 0.3-0.9 mm/h smaller than the observed ones, for convective and stratiform precipitation, respectively. These results suggest that the quadratic function between storm top altitudes and rain rates have potential applications in precipitation parameterization of models and climatic studies.