• Atmosphere
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• v.16 no.4
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• pp.359-370
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• 2006

Terrain height variance spectra for the Korean mountain region are calculated in order to determine an adequate grid size required to resolve terrain forcing on mesoscale model simulation. One-dimensional spectral analysis is applied to specifically the central-eastern part of the Korean mountain region, where topographical-scale forcing has an important effect on mesoscale atmospheric flow. It is found that the terrain height variance spectra in this mountain region has a wavelength dependence with the power law exponents of 1.5 at the wavelength near 30 km, but this dependence is steeply changed to 2.5 at the wavelength less than 30 km. For the adequate horizontal grid size selection on mesoscale simulation two-dimensional terrain height spectral analysis is also performed. There is no directionality within 50% of spectral energy region, so one-dimensional spectral analysis can be reasonably applied to the Korea Peninsula. According to the spectral analysis of terrain height variance, the finer grid size which is higher than 6 km is required to resolve a 90% of terrain variance in this region. Numerical simulation using WRF (Weather Research and Forecasting Model) was performed to evaluate the effect of different terrain resolution in accordance with the result of spectral analysis. The simulated results were quantitatively compared to observations and there was a significant improvement in the wind prediction across the mountain region as the grid space decreased from 18 km to 2 km. The results will provide useful guidance of grid size selection on mesoscale topographical simulation over the Korean mountain region.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.51 no.6
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• pp.1575-1588
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• 2019

Fracture near the U-10Mo/cladding material interface impacts fuel service life. In this work, a mesoscale stress model is developed with the fuel foil considered as a porous medium having gas bubbles and bearing bubble pressure and surface tension. The models for the evolution of bubble volume fraction, size and internal pressure are also obtained. For a U-10Mo/Al monolithic fuel plate under location-dependent irradiation, the finite element simulation of the thermo-mechanical coupling behavior is implemented to obtain the bubble distribution and evolution behavior together with their effects on the mesoscale stresses. The numerical simulation results indicate that higher macroscale tensile stresses appear close to the locations with the maximum increments of fuel foil thickness, which is intensively related to irradiation creep deformations. The maximum mesoscale tensile stress is more than 2 times of the macroscale one on the irradiation time of 98 days, which results from the contributions of considerable volume fraction and internal pressure of bubbles. This study lays a foundation for the fracture mechanism analysis and development of a fracture criterion for U-10Mo monolithic fuels.

• Computers and Concrete
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• v.15 no.2
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• pp.305-319
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• 2015

On mesoscopic level, concrete can be treated as a three-phase composite material consisting of mortar, aggregates and interfacial transition zone (ITZ) between mortar and aggregate. A lot of research has confirmed that ITZ plays a crucial role in the mechanical fracture process of concrete. The aim of the present study is to propose a numerical method on mesoscale to analyze the failure mechanism of reinforced concrete (RC) structures under mechanical loading, and then it will help precisely predict the damage or the cracking initiation and propagation of concrete. Concrete is meshed by means of the Rigid Body Spring Model (RBSM) concept, while the reinforcing steel bars are modeled as beam-type elements. Two kinds of RC members, i.e. subjected to uniaxial tension and beams under bending, the fracture process of concrete and the distribution of cracks, as well as the load-deflection relationships are investigated and compared with the available test results. It is found that the numerical results are in good agreement with the experimental observations, indicating that the model can successfully simulate the failure process of the RC members.

• The Plant Pathology Journal
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• v.21 no.2
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• pp.111-118
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• 2005

Weather data for disease forecasts are usually derived from automated weather stations (AWS) that may be dispersed across a region in an irregular pattern. We have developed an alternative method to simulate local scale, high-resolution weather and plant disease in a grid pattern. The system incorporates a simplified mesoscale boundary layer model, LAWSS, for estimating local conditions such as air temperature and relative humidity. It also integrates special models for estimating of surface wetness duration and disease forecasts, such as the grapevine downy mildew forecast model, DMCast. The system can recreate weather forecasts utilizing the NCEP/NCAR reanalysis database, which contains over 57 years of archived and corrected global upper air conditions. The highest horizontal resolution of 0.150 km was achieved by running 5-step nested child grids inside coarse mother grids. Over the Finger Lakes and Chautauqua Lake regions of New York State, the system simulated three growing seasons for estimating the risk of grape downy mildew with 1 km resolution. Outputs were represented as regional maps or as site-specific graphs. The highest resolutions were achieved over North America, but the system is functional for any global location. The system is expected to be a powerful tool for site selection and reanalysis of historical plant disease epidemics.

• Ocean Science Journal
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• v.43 no.4
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• pp.165-173
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• 2008

In this article, we describe a simple yet effective method for insertion of observational datasets in a mesoscale atmospheric model used in one-dimensional configuration through Nudging. To demonstrate the effectiveness of this technique, vertical profiles of meteorological parameters obtained from GLASS Sonde launches from a tiny island of Kaashidhoo in the Republic of Maldives are injected in a mesoscale atmospheric model - Advanced Regional Prediction System (ARPS), and model simulated parameters are compared with the available observational datasets. Analysis of one-time nudging in the model simulations over Kaashidhoo show that incorporation of this technique reasonably improves the model simulations within a time domain of +6 to +12 Hrs, while its impact on +18 Hrs simulations and beyond becomes literally null.

• Atmosphere
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• v.26 no.2
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• pp.277-288
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• 2016

Polar lows are intense mesoscale cyclones that mainly occur over the sea in polar regions. Owing to their small spatial scale of a diameter less than 1000 km, simulating polar lows is a challenging task. At King Sejong station in West Antartica, polar lows are often observed. Despite the recent significant climatic changes observed over West Antarctica, adequate validation of regional simulations of extreme weather events such as polar lows are rare for this region. To address this gap, simulation results from a recent version of the Polar Weather Research and Forecasting model (Polar WRF) covering Antartic Peninsula at a high horizontal resolution of 3 km are validated against near-surface meteorological observations. We selected a case of high wind speed event on 7 January 2013 recorded at Automatic Meteorological Observation Station (AMOS) in King Sejong station, Antarctica. It is revealed by in situ observations, numerical weather prediction, and reanalysis fields that the synoptic and mesoscale environment of the strong wind event was due to the passage of a strong mesoscale polar low of center pressure 950 hPa. Verifying model results from 3 km grid resolution simulation against AMOS observation showed that high skill in simulating wind speed and surface pressure with a bias of $-1.1m\;s^{-1}$ and -1.2 hPa, respectively. Our evaluation suggests that the Polar WRF can be used as a useful dynamic downscaling tool for the simulation of Antartic weather systems and the near-surface meteorological instruments installed in King Sejong station can provide invaluable data for polar low studies over West Antartica.

• Proceedings of the KSRS Conference
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• 2008.10a
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• pp.297-300
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• 2008

High-resolution mesoscale meteorological modeling requires more accurate and higher resolution digital elevation model (DEM) data. Shuttle Radar Topographic Mission (SRTM) has created 90 m DEM for entire globe and that is freely available for meteorological modeling and environmental applications. In this research, the effects of the topographic interpolation methods on high-resolution wind field simulation in the coastal regions were quantitatively analyzed using Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) model with SRTM data. Sensitivity experiments with three different interpolation schemes (four-point bilinear, sixteen-point overlapping parabolic and nearest neighbor interpolation methods) were preformed using SRTM. In WRF modeling with sixteen-point overlapping parabolic interpolation, the coastal line and some small islands show more clearly than other cases. The maximum height of inland is around 140 meters higher, while the minimum of sea height is about 80 meter lower. As it concerns the results of each scheme it seems that the sixteen-point overlapping parabolic scheme indicates the well agreement with observed surface wind data. Consequently, topographic changes due to interpolation methods can lead to the significant influence on mesoscale wind field simulation of WRF modeling.

• Journal of Environmental Science International
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• v.18 no.4
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• pp.375-388
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• 2009

Numerical simulation is essential to indicate the flow of the atmosphere in the region with a complicated topography which consists of many mountains in the inland while it is neighboring the seashore. Such complicated topography produces land and sea breeze as the mesoscale phenomenon of meteorology which results from the effect of the sea and inland. In the mesoscale simulation examines, the change of the temperature in relation to the one of the sea surface for the boundary condition and, in the inland, the interaction between the atmosphere and land surface reflecting the characteristic of the land surface. This research developed and simulated PNULSM to reflect both the SST and vegetation effect as a bottom boundary for detailed meteorological numerical simulation in coastal urban area. The result from four experiments performed according to this protocol revealed the change of temperature field and wind field depending on each effect. Therefore, the lower level of establishment of bottom boundary suitable for the characteristic of the region is necessary to figure out the atmospheric flow more precisely, and if the characteristic of the surface is improved to more realistic conditions, it will facilitate the simulation of regional environment.

• Atmosphere
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• v.18 no.4
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• pp.339-354
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• 2008

A numerical simulation of a heavy snowfall event that occurred 13 January 2008 along the Yeongdong coastal area, was performed using WRF (Weather Research and Forecasting) in order to reveal mesoscale structures and to construct a conceptual model showing the meteorological background that caused the large difference in snowfall amounts between the Yeongdong mountain area and the Yeongdong coastal area. The simulation results matched well with various observations such as corresponding 12h-accumulated observed precipitation, surface wind obscrvation, radar echoes, and satellite infrared images. The simulation and the observations showed that the scale of the event was of meso - $\beta$ and meso - $\gamma$ scale. The simulation represented well the mesoscale process causing the large difference in snowfall amounts in the two areas. First, wind flow was kept, to a certain extent, from crossing the mountains due to the blocking effect of the low Froude number (~1). The northeast flow over the adjaccnt sea tumcd northwest as it approachcd the mountains, where it was trapped, allowing so-called cold air damming. Second, a strong convergence area formed where the cold northwest flow along the Yeongdong coastal area and the relatively warm and moist northeast flow advecting toward the coast met, supporting the fonllation of a coastal front. Thus, the vertical motion was strongest over the front located near the coast, leading to the heavy snowfall there rather than in the remote mountain area.

• Computers and Concrete
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• v.10 no.2
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• pp.135-147
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• 2012

At mesoscale, concrete is considered as a three-phase composite material consisting of the aggregate particles, the cement matrix and the interfacial transition zone (ITZ). The reconstruction of the internal structures for concrete composites requires the identification of the boundary of the aggregate particles and the cement matrix using digital imaging technology followed by post-processing through MATLAB. A parameter study covers the subsection transformation, median filter, and open and close operation of the digital image sample to obtain the optimal parameter for performing the image processing technology. The subsection transformation is performed using a grey histogram of the digital image samples with a threshold value of [120, 210] followed by median filtering with a $16{\times}16$ square module based on the dimensions of the aggregate particles and their internal impurity. We then select a "disk" tectonic structure with a specific radius, which performs open and close operations on the images. The edges of the aggregate particles (similar to the original digital images) are obtained using the canny edge detection method. The finite element model at mesoscale can be established using the proposed image processing technology. The location of the crack determined through the numerical method is identical to the experimental result, and the load-displacement curve determined through the numerical method is in close agreement with the experimental results. Comparisons of the numerical and experimental results show that the proposed image processing technology is highly effective in reconstructing the internal structures of concrete composites.