UA-ICON with the NWP physics package (version ua-icon-2.1): mean state and variability of the middle atmosphere

Kunze, Markus; Zülicke, Christoph; Siddiqui, Tarique A.; Stephan, Claudia C.; Yamazaki, Yosuke; Stolle, Claudia; Borchert, Sebastian; Schmidt, Hauke

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-18-3359-2025

Articles | Volume 18, issue 11

https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-18-3359-2025

© Author(s) 2025. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-18-3359-2025

© Author(s) 2025. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Articles | Volume 18, issue 11

Model evaluation paper

|

11 Jun 2025

Model evaluation paper |

| 11 Jun 2025

UA-ICON with the NWP physics package (version ua-icon-2.1): mean state and variability of the middle atmosphere

Markus Kunze, Christoph Zülicke, Tarique A. Siddiqui, Claudia C. Stephan, Yosuke Yamazaki, Claudia Stolle, Sebastian Borchert, and Hauke Schmidt

Supplement

https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-18-3359-2025-supplement

Data sets

Supplementary data for Figures of "UA-ICON with NWP physics package (version: ua-icon-2.1): mean state and variability of the middle atmosphere" Markus Kunze et al. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.15030995

MERRA-2 inst3_3d_asm_Np: 3d,3-Hourly,Instantaneous,Pressure-Level,Assimilation,Assimilated Meteorological Fields V5.12.4 Global Modeling and Assimilation Office (GMAO) https://doi.org/10.5067/QBZ6MG944HW0

ERA5 hourly data on pressure levels from 1940 to present H. Hersbach et al. https://doi.org/10.24381/cds.bd0915c6

MLS/Aura Level 2 Temperature V005 M. Schwartz et al. https://doi.org/10.5067/Aura/MLS/DATA2520

Model code and software

Supplementary information on - UA-ICON with NWP physics package (version: ua-icon-2.1): mean state and variability of the middle atmosphere Markus Kunze et al. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.13927890

ICON release 2024.01 ICON partnership (DWD; MPI-M; DKRZ; KIT; C2SM) https://doi.org/10.35089/WDCC/IconRelease01

Short summary

We present the Icosahedral Nonhydrostatic (ICON) general circulation model with an upper-atmospheric extension with the physics package for numerical weather prediction (UA-ICON(NWP)). We optimized the parameters for the gravity wave parameterizations and achieved realistic modeling of the thermal and dynamic states of the mesopause regions. UA-ICON(NWP) now shows a realistic frequency of major sudden stratospheric warmings and well-represented solar tides in temperature.