The LMD Mars Global Circulation
Model and Mars Climate Database
E. Millour, F. Forget, L. Montabone, A. Spiga, A. Colaitis,T. Navarro, J.-B. Madeleine, LMD, France
F. Lefèvre, J.-Y. Chaufray, F. Montmessin, LATMOS, France
F. Gonzalez-Galindo, M.-A. Lopez-Valverde, IAA, Spain
S. Lewis, Open University, P. Read, AOPP, UK
M.-C. Desjean, CNES, Toulouse, France,J.-P. Huot, ESA, ESTEC, Netherlands
and the MCD/GCM teamThe LMD Global Circulation Models
a brief history of LMDZThe Pioneers : in the 1960s-70s : Robert Sadourny and Phu Le Van(Sadourny, 1975)● The LMD5/LMD6 model : 1980-1985 (Laval, 1981)● 1985 : Rewriting of the dynamical core : modularity and zoom (theprevious version had been written over punch cards with a very small
RAM memory).
● 1990 : versions for Mars, Titan, and a generic 20-parameter version(Frédéric Hourdin).
● 1992 : decision to develop the terrestrial model on the basis of this new
dynamical core by adapting the physical package of LMD5/6=> planetary and Earth versions of LMDZ grow in different directions● 1990s-2000s : Development of Earth, Venus, Mars, Titan models● 2008 : development of a « generic » GCM to study exoplanets (butalso Early Mars, Early Earth, … and now the stratosphere of gasgiants).
● 2011-now : start working on getting all versions to converge (use acommon dynamical core) into a main framework to benefit from
improvements in all directions (e.g. : parallelism of the code, newdynamical core).
●Building a “virtual” Mars
Objective : to accurately simulate the details of Mars
meteorology based on physical equations
Observations

RealityModelOverview of ourGeneral
Circulation Modelfor Mars
1) Hydrodynamical code
⇒ to compute large scale atmospheric motions
LMDZ grid point model :Typical horizontal resolution 64x48 (+possibility of zoom)2) Physical parameterizations•⇒ to force the dynamic⇒ to compute the details of the local climate•

Radiative heating & cooling of the atmosphere (solar and thermal IR) by
CO2 and dust●
Surface thermal balance●
Subgrid scale atmospheric motions: Turbulence in the boundary layer,
convection, orography drag, gravity wave drag●Condensation of CO2●Water ice clouds and their radiative effect●Chemistry, thermosphere, ...

Horizontal grid of the LMD Mars GCM
the 64x48 “standard resolution” : 5.625°× 3.75°

LMD Mars GCM at “high” resolution : 184x90
2°× 2°

GCM : Zoomed grid (96x68) to locally reach higher
resolution (1.8°× 0.6°) at reduced cost:Photochemical cycle

Upper atmosphere processes
and ionosphereModeling the Martian CO2 cycle

CO2 ice varying albedo

Noncondensable
gaz depletion

Storage of heatin subsurface
water ice

Noncondensable
gaz enrichment
and inducedconvectionModeling the Martian CO2 cycleGoal: to obtain agood fit of thesurface pressure asmeasured byVicking Lander 1

IN, IS : Thermal inertia ofsubsurface water icetables
DN,DN: Ice table depthModeling subgrid processes, convection and turbulence
New convective thermal
models to replace “simple”
convective adjustment- Improved thermal drag coef.
and subgrid scale gustiness.
(Colaitis et al. 2013)●Mixed layer

Surface layer

Roughness Length“z0” Map derived
from Extended
Martian Rock
Abundance Data
(Hebrard et al.
2011)Modeling the dust cycle to simulate observed
Martian years (MY24 – MY30)
Improved dust
radiativetransfer andproperties(Wolff et al.
2009) devil
Dust

Multisize

Multisize
Constant global lifting

Column dust
opacity isnormalizedusing aninput column
dust scenario
opacityZonal mean of reconstructed dust
opacities for Martian years 24-30- We had to combine observations fromTES (MY24-27), THEMIS (MY26-30),
MERs (MY26-30) and MCS (MY28-30).
- We performed gridding of non-uniform
observations on a regular grid (5°x5° lonlat, 1 sol) using weighted binning- We obtained more or less incomplete
maps of total dust opacity, depending on
the density of observations- We interpolated the maps using
kriging, and we finally obtained complete,daily maps of dust opacity on a regulargrid.
Montabone et al. 2013, submitted

Transported dust mixing ratio and size distribution (2 moment scheme)

Madeleine et al. 2011

Transported dust mixing ratio and size distribution (2 moment scheme)

Madeleine et al. 2011

Transported dust mixing ratio and size distribution (2 moment scheme)

Madeleine et al. 2011

Transported dust mixing ratio and size distribution (2 moment scheme)

Madeleine et al. 2011

(Wolff et al.
2009)

Madeleine et al. 2011

Impact of radiatively active clouds on
temperature simulated in the LMD GCM(Madeleine et al. 2011)

Modeling the Martian water cycle

Representation of ice
permanent reservoirs(outliers, albedo,thermal inertia…)

IR and solar
walengthradiative
effects ofclouds

Cloud
microphysics(nucleation,growth, dust
scavenging )Modeling the Martian Water Cycle
Work on a better modeling of the water cycle is in the core or the last 5years of development… and it is not over...
Bottom line: Obtaining (tuning) a good water cycle is really tough…

Illustration off the difficulties ; concept slide from Thomas Navarro

Modeling the Martian Water Cycle
Among the things that work:
Water vapor profiles with improved
microphysics: comparison with SPICAM solar
occultation data of H2O supersaturation

Modeling the Martian Water Cycle
Among the things that do not work:
LMD GCM and MCS observations comparison
Nighttime Ice Opacity, MY30, lat=-8, Ls=145• Quite different clouds; in thickness (10 times more in the GCM thanseen by MCS) and location…

Inclusion of chemistry and upper atmosphere(mesosphere/thermosphere) proceses in theLMD GCM
F. Gonzalez Galindo / M.A. Lopez-Valverde (IAA, Spain)
J.-Y. Chaufray (LATMOS)

Main improvements over the last ~5 years- Better representation of the chemistry and photochemistry
reactions (F. Lefèvre, LATMOS)- Improved CO2 NLTE cooling (latest M.A. Lopez-Valverde
scheme, using actual CO2 levels and bands, and taking into
account the variations of atomic O).
- Improved representation of molecular diffusion- Complete neutral-ion interaction Ionospheric Model in the GCM- Creation of a fully dynamic Ionospheric model (side project byJ.-Y. Chauffray, not in the standard GCM)

Comparison with SPICAM data :Impact of new NLTE 15 µm cooling parametrisation:

Seasonal evolution
SPICAM vs GCM density
Unusual dustloading
OLD GCM?
Obsz = 100km

Seasonal evolution
SPICAM vs GCM density

NEW GCM
MY27

Obsz = 100km

SPICAM vs GCM density

z = 100km

NEW GCM
MY27Obs

Variability : GCM results vary from day to day (here: a 5days window)

Synthesis : application of the LMD GCM
Strong Collaboration with LATMOS (IPSL, France),
The Open University and the University of Oxford (UK) , IAA (Granada, Spain)

Dynamic
Dynamic

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PhotoPhotoChemistry
Chemistry« Mars Climate database »•Reference tool for the scientificand engineers for the spacecommunity•« full » versions on DVD-ROM
requested by ~150 teams in~30 countries• Interactive web site

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The Mars Climate Databasea brief history of the MCD project• 1995: ESA (European Space Agency) and CNES (French SpaceAgency) identify the need for a better comprehension of theMartian environment for future missions to Mars.
• 1995: The LMD and AOPP (Oxford University) groups (laterjoined by the IAA, Spain, group) team up, and funded by ESAand CNES , improve their GCMs to provide outputs (the MCD) tothe Space agencies and the scientific community.
• 2001: MCDv3.0 (and then MCDv3.1) is released (the first to bereally distributed, with a large number of users).
• 2005 : MCDv4.0 and MCDv4.1 released.
• 2006 : MCDv4.2 released.
• 2008 : MCDv4.3 released.
• 2012: MCDv5.0 released (there will probably be an MCDv5.1 in2013)

What is the Mars Climate Database ?
●●

●

●

The Mars Climate Database (MCD) is a database derived from
Global Climate Model (GCM) simulations.
The MCD is intended to be useful for engineering applications(e.g. Entry Descent & Landing studies) and scientific work which
require accurate knowledge of the Martian atmosphere (e.g.
Analysis of observations).
The MCD is freely available, either via an online access(http://www-mars.lmd.jussieu.fr) for moderate needs, or a more
complete version which includes advanced post-processing
software.
Over the years, the MCD has been distributed to more than 150
teams around the world.

MCD contents & main features●●The MCD provides mean values and statistics of main
meteorological variables: pressure, atmospheric density,temperature, winds, along with their variability and means toreconstruct realistic perturbed states of the atmosphere.
Example of variables included in the MCD:- Surface temperature and pressure- Thermal and solar radiative fluxes- CO2 ice cover- Dust column opacity and mass mixing ratio- [H2O] vapour and [H2O] ice columns and mixing ratio- [CO], [O], [O2], [N2], [CO2], [H2], [O3], ... volume mixing ratios- Air specific heat capacity, viscosity and reduced gas constant r- Height of the PBL (Planetary Boundary Layer), friction velocity- Maximum updraft and downdraft vertical winds in the PBL

MCD contents & main features• The MCD provides a set of dust scenarios (topped with EUV
upper atmosphere solar max, ave or min conditions) designed
to “bracket reality”.

MCD contents & main features●The MCD extends up to the thermosphere (overall up to ~350to ~500 km) where the influence of Extreme Ultra Violet (EUV)
input from the Sun is significant.
3 EUV scenarios:• Minimum• Average• Maximum

MCD v5 dust scenarios• The MCD provides a set of dust scenarios (topped with EUV
upper atmosphere solar max, ave or min conditions) designed
to “bracket reality”.
• A “Climatology” dust scenario: derived from thecombination of runs from individual years, in order to provide
a mean climatology for years without global dust storms• A “cold” (low dust) scenario• A “warm” (high dust) scenario• A “dust storm” scenario: with fixed high opacity (tau=5) andusing Ockert-Bell (dark) dust properties.

MCD v5 dustscenarios• Combining the outputs ofruns from all 5 “non-global
dust storm” years (MY 24, 26,27, 29, 30), we generate themean Mars year
climatology.
•In addition, the variability
encompassed in all thesesimulations is included in theMCDv5 improved large-scale
perturbation scheme.

The Mean Year Dust Scenario• The “climatology scenario” is simply compiled as anensemble average of the five separate MY runs.

MCD v5 dust scenarios• The cold scenario:
Very low amount ofairborne dust. Dust
opacity at a given
season and location istaken as the minimum
over the 7 Martianyears MY24-MY30 dust
scenarios, moreover
decreased by 30%.

MCD v5 dust scenarios• The warm scenario:
Very high amount ofairborne dust (but not aplanet encircling dust
storm event). Dust opacity
at given season andlocation is taken as themaximum over the 7Martian years (excludingthe global dust stormperiods during MY25 andMY28), moreover
increased by 30%.

MCD v5 dust scenarios• The dust storm scenario: An extreme case of fixed highopacity (tau=5) combined with “darker dust” properties (ie:using Ockert-Bell dust properties instead of Wolff et al.
properties).
Upper right: Ockert Bell dust
Lower right: Wolff et al. dust
Lower left: Temperature difference
between darker and nominal dust:
warming around 60km.

MCD high resolution outputs• The GCM from which the MCD is derived is run at 5.625° x
3.75° resolution in longitude x latitude.
• The MCD post-processing software includes a high resolution
mode based on 32 pix./deg. MOLA topography

High resolution surfacepressure is obtained by
combining MCD surfacepressure, MOLA
topography and VL1
pressure records(procedure validated by
Spiga et al. 2007)

MCD high resolution outputs• The high resolution scheme extends to the reconstruction of
atmospheric variables (empirical scheme validated using highresolution GCM runs).
Example: temperatures above Valles Marineris

MCD high resolution outputs• The high resolution scheme extends to the reconstruction ofatmospheric variables (empirical scheme validated using highresolution GCM runs).
Example: temperatures above Valles Marineris

MCD variability models• In addition to the mean climatological values, the MCD includes theday-to-day variability (RMS) of main meteorological variables(density, temperature, winds, pressure, ...)• Example: surface pressure at VL2 site:

MCD variability models• Users may reconstruct variability by adding perturbations to themean climatological values, as small scale perturbations (gravitywaves)• Example: MGS Radio Occultation and MCD predictions with random
gravity waves.
•Altitude (m)•••Temperature (K)Gravity waves are notrepresented in the GCM
simulations (sub-gridparameterization)
Source & intensity
depends on low-level
wind and sub-grid scale
topography
Tunable vertical
wavelength (2 to 30 km;
default : 16 km)
Constant amplitude
above 100 km

MCD variability models• Users may reconstruct variability by adding perturbations to themean climatological values, as large scale perturbations(reconstructed from EOFs derived from GCM runs).
• Example: Opportunity entry profile

Altitude (km)Profilesperturbedwith large
scale
perturbation
model

Temperature (K)Mars Climate Database, summary●●●The Mars Climate Database (MCD) is a database derived from
Global Climate Model (GCM) simulations.
The MCD is intended to be useful for engineering applications(e.g. Entry Descent & Landing studies) and scientific work which
require accurate knowledge of the Martian atmosphere (e.g.
Analysis of observations).
With the MCD, one may explore the climatology of Mars, butalso its variability.

●The MCD is freely available, to obtain a copy, just ask us!

●One can also access a limited online version of the MCD:
http://www-mars.lmd.jussieu.fr/mcd_python(python interface by A. Spiga, currently for MCDv4.3;
MCDv5.0 under beta testing)