Giovanni and YOTC

Giovanni and the Year of Tropical Convection

Lack of fundamental knowledge and practical capabilities in tropical convection leaves the global climate community disadvantaged in modeling and predicting prominent phenomena of the tropical atmosphere, such as the Intertropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ), El Niño-Southern Oscillation events (ENSO), monsoons and their active/break periods, the Madden-Julian Oscillation (MJO), subtropical stratus decks, near-surface ocean properties, tropical cyclones, and even the diurnal cycle. The Year of Tropical Convection (YOTC), a joint activity of the World Climate Research Programme (WCRP) and World Weather Research Programme (WWRP)/THORPEX, is a 2-year period (May 2008 – April 2010) of coordinated observing, modeling, and forecasting with a focus on organized tropical convection, its prediction, and predictability.

The goal of the Goddard Giovanni for YOTC project at the NASA Goddard Earth Sciences (GES) and Data Information Services Center is to facilitate NASA satellite data usage by providing a way the YOTC community can easily read, subset, visualize, access, and harmonize data from multiple space-borne sensors.