The VAMOS Ocean-Cloud-Atmosphere-Land Study (VOCALS) is an international

field experiment Field experiments are experiments carried out outside of laboratory settings. They randomly assign subjects (or other sampling units) to either treatment or control groups to test claims of causal relationships. Random assignment helps establ ...

started in 2006 designed by

World Climate Research Programme The World Climate Research Programme (WCRP) is an international programme that helps to coordinate global climate research. The WCRP was established in 1980, under the joint sponsorship of the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) and the Inte ...

's core project

CLIVAR CLIVAR (climate and ocean: variability, predictability and change) is one of six projects of the World Climate Research Programme. Its purpose is to describe and understand climate variability and predictability on seasonal to centennial time-scale ...

to better understand

physical Physical may refer to: *Physical examination In a physical examination, medical examination, clinical examination, or medical checkup, a medical practitioner examines a patient for any possible medical signs or symptoms of a Disease, medical co ...

and

chemical process In a scientific sense, a chemical process is a method or means of somehow changing one or more chemicals or chemical compounds. Such a chemical process can occur by itself or be caused by an outside force, and involves a chemical reaction of som ...

es central to the

climate system Earth's climate system is a complex system with five interacting components: the Atmosphere of Earth, atmosphere (air), the hydrosphere (water), the cryosphere (ice and permafrost), the lithosphere (earth's upper rocky layer) and the biosphere ( ...

of the Southeast Pacific region. The program was organized in two parts: the VOCALS Regional Experiment (VOCALS-Rex) , and the VOCALS Numerical Modeling (VOCALS-Mod). VOCALS-REx occurred in October and November 2008. It makes up a great deal of the CLIVAR program, (VOCALS) was designed to promote scientific enterprises in the Southeastern Pacific, in order to better understand coupled ocean-atmosphere-land system on diurnal to interannual timescales. VOCALS-REx will also provide datasets for the evaluation and development of large scale numerical models. VOCALS-REx is in five research aircraft, two ships and two surface sites in Northern Chile. Research papers summarizing the results of the program are published i
special issue 184
of

Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics ''Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics'' is an open access peer-reviewed scientific journal published by the European Geosciences Union. It covers research on the Earth's atmosphere and the underlying chemical and physical processes, including the al ...

, a journal of the

European Geosciences Union The European Geosciences Union (EGU) is a non-profit international union in the fields of Earth, planetary, and space sciences whose vision is to "realise a sustainable and just future for humanity and for the planet". The organisation has headq ...

References

External links

* Climatological research Meteorology research and field projects {{climatology-stub