Yao Fengchao

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Yao
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Fengchao
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  • Article
    Towards an end-to-end analysis and prediction system for weather, climate, and marine applications in the Red Sea
    (American Meteorological Society, 2021-01-01) Hoteit, Ibrahim ; Abualnaja, Yasser ; Afzal, Shehzad ; Ait-El-Fquih, Boujemaa ; Akylas, Triantaphyllos ; Antony, Charls ; Dawson, Clint N. ; Asfahani, Khaled ; Brewin, Robert J. W. ; Cavaleri, Luigi ; Cerovecki, Ivana ; Cornuelle, Bruce D. ; Desamsetti, Srinivas ; Attada, Raju ; Dasari, Hari ; Sanchez-Garrido, Jose ; Genevier, Lily ; El Gharamti, Mohamad ; Gittings, John A. ; Gokul, Elamurugu ; Gopalakrishnan, Ganesh ; Guo, Daquan ; Hadri, Bilel ; Hadwiger, Markus ; Hammoud, Mohammed Abed ; Hendershott, Myrl ; Hittawe, Mohamad ; Karumuri, Ashok ; Knio, Omar ; Kohl, Armin ; Kortas, Samuel ; Krokos, George ; Kunchala, Ravi ; Issa, Leila ; Lakkis, Issam ; Langodan, Sabique ; Lermusiaux, Pierre F. J. ; Luong, Thang ; Ma, Jingyi ; Le Maitre, Olivier ; Mazloff, Matthew R. ; El Mohtar, Samah ; Papadopoulos, Vassilis P. ; Platt, Trevor ; Pratt, Lawrence J. ; Raboudi, Naila ; Racault, Marie-Fanny ; Raitsos, Dionysios E. ; Razak, Shanas ; Sanikommu, Sivareddy ; Sathyendranath, Shubha ; Sofianos, Sarantis S. ; Subramanian, Aneesh C. ; Sun, Rui ; Titi, Edriss ; Toye, Habib ; Triantafyllou, George ; Tsiaras, Kostas ; Vasou, Panagiotis ; Viswanadhapalli, Yesubabu ; Wang, Yixin ; Yao, Fengchao ; Zhan, Peng ; Zodiatis, George
    The Red Sea, home to the second-longest coral reef system in the world, is a vital resource for the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. The Red Sea provides 90% of the Kingdom’s potable water by desalinization, supporting tourism, shipping, aquaculture, and fishing industries, which together contribute about 10%–20% of the country’s GDP. All these activities, and those elsewhere in the Red Sea region, critically depend on oceanic and atmospheric conditions. At a time of mega-development projects along the Red Sea coast, and global warming, authorities are working on optimizing the harnessing of environmental resources, including renewable energy and rainwater harvesting. All these require high-resolution weather and climate information. Toward this end, we have undertaken a multipronged research and development activity in which we are developing an integrated data-driven regional coupled modeling system. The telescopically nested components include 5-km- to 600-m-resolution atmospheric models to address weather and climate challenges, 4-km- to 50-m-resolution ocean models with regional and coastal configurations to simulate and predict the general and mesoscale circulation, 4-km- to 100-m-resolution ecosystem models to simulate the biogeochemistry, and 1-km- to 50-m-resolution wave models. In addition, a complementary probabilistic transport modeling system predicts dispersion of contaminant plumes, oil spill, and marine ecosystem connectivity. Advanced ensemble data assimilation capabilities have also been implemented for accurate forecasting. Resulting achievements include significant advancement in our understanding of the regional circulation and its connection to the global climate, development, and validation of long-term Red Sea regional atmospheric–oceanic–wave reanalyses and forecasting capacities. These products are being extensively used by academia, government, and industry in various weather and marine studies and operations, environmental policies, renewable energy applications, impact assessment, flood forecasting, and more.
  • Article
    Seasonal overturning circulation in the Red Sea : 2. Winter circulation
    (John Wiley & Sons, 2014-04-14) Yao, Fengchao ; Hoteit, Ibrahim ; Pratt, Lawrence J. ; Bower, Amy S. ; Kohl, Armin ; Gopalakrishnan, Ganesh ; Rivas, David
    The shallow winter overturning circulation in the Red Sea is studied using a 50 year high-resolution MITgcm (MIT general circulation model) simulation with realistic atmospheric forcing. The overturning circulation for a typical year, represented by 1980, and the climatological mean are analyzed using model output to delineate the three-dimensional structure and to investigate the underlying dynamical mechanisms. The horizontal model circulation in the winter of 1980 is dominated by energetic eddies. The climatological model mean results suggest that the surface inflow intensifies in a western boundary current in the southern Red Sea that switches to an eastern boundary current north of 24°N. The overturning is accomplished through a cyclonic recirculation and a cross-basin overturning circulation in the northern Red Sea, with major sinking occurring along a narrow band of width about 20 km along the eastern boundary and weaker upwelling along the western boundary. The northward pressure gradient force, strong vertical mixing, and horizontal mixing near the boundary are the essential dynamical components in the model's winter overturning circulation. The simulated water exchange is not hydraulically controlled in the Strait of Bab el Mandeb; instead, the exchange is limited by bottom and lateral boundary friction and, to a lesser extent, by interfacial friction due to the vertical viscosity at the interface between the inflow and the outflow.
  • Article
    Seasonal overturning circulation in the Red Sea : 1. Model validation and summer circulation
    (John Wiley & Sons, 2014-04-14) Yao, Fengchao ; Hoteit, Ibrahim ; Pratt, Lawrence J. ; Bower, Amy S. ; Kohl, Armin ; Gopalakrishnan, Ganesh ; Rivas, David
    The overturning circulation in the Red Sea exhibits a distinct seasonally reversing pattern and is studied using high-resolution MIT general circulation model simulations. In the first part of this study, the vertical and horizontal structure of the summer overturning circulation and its dynamical mechanisms are presented from the model results. The seasonal water exchange in the Strait of Bab el Mandeb is successfully simulated, and the structures of the intruding subsurface Gulf of Aden intermediate water are in good agreement with summer observations in 2011. The model results suggest that the summer overturning circulation is driven by the combined effect of the shoaling of the thermocline in the Gulf of Aden resulting from remote winds in the Arabian Sea and an upward surface slope from the Red Sea to the Gulf of Aden set up by local surface winds in the Red Sea. In addition, during late summer two processes associated, respectively, with latitudinally differential heating and increased salinity in the southern Red Sea act together to cause the reversal of the contrast of the vertical density structure and the cessation of the summer overturning circulation. Dynamically, the subsurface northward pressure gradient force is mainly balanced by vertical viscosity resulting from the vertical shear and boundary friction in the Strait of Bab el Mandeb. Unlike some previous studies, the three-layer summer exchange flows in the Strait of Bab el Mandeb do not appear to be hydraulically controlled.