Enhancing Modeling Capabilities of Land-Atmosphere Interactions to Address Environmental Challenges

October 02, 2025

Cenlin He

Hosted by Dien Wu

Abstract

Land-atmosphere interactions play a critical role in the Earth system, particularly related to extreme events such as drought and fire, food-water security and agriculture management, as well as subseasonal-to-seasonal (S2S) prediction. Land models coupled with Earth system models (ESMs) are useful tools to tackle these environmental challenges. Noah-MP is one of the most widely-used land models in the world, which has been adopted in many coupled operational and research systems (e.g., NOAA/UFS, NASA/LIS, WRF, MPAS, WRF-Hydro/NWM, etc.). As a leading Noah-MP model developer group, our study has been focused on enhancing the model capabilities of land processes and interaction with hydroclimate, with applications in predicting high-impact events and modeling impacts of human activities. In this presentation, I will briefly introduce the Noah-MP model and community, and then I will give a few research examples our group did recently in improving the understanding and quantifications of (1) irrigation-groundwater-atmosphere interaction and impacts on precipitation recycling and mesoscale convective systems (MCSs), (2) the role of land-atmosphere interaction in S2S predictions as part of NCAR's ESPAT initiative, and (3) drought-fire-snow interactions by combining AI/ML techniques with physical models.

Cenlin is leading the land-atmosphere interaction team at NSF NCAR Research Applications Laboratory. His research focuses on advancing knowledge and modeling capabilities of land processes and land-atmosphere interactions in Earth system modeling to enable actionable sciences and society-relevant applications. Specifically, He is the co-lead of the land-atmosphere interaction working group of the GEWEX Regional Hydroclimate Program (H2US). He is leading and coordinating the international community efforts for the Noah-MP land model and WRF-Urban/MPAS-Urban model developments. He is the co-founder and co-chair of an international initiative called U-APIC (Urban Air Pollution and Interaction with Climate) sponsored by IGAC. In recent years, Cenlin has focused on tackling critical environmental challenges, including drought, wildfire, snowpack dynamics, water resources, urban extremes, agriculture and food-water security, subseasonal-to-seasonal (S2S) predictions, and AI/ML applications. He is currently co-leading the S2S Land-Atmosphere Interaction focused area of NSF NCAR ESPAT initiative.