Last updated: 10 May 2022
The documentation files of the COSMO model is split in seven parts, (made available since 2003). These parts are:
| No | Title | Version |
|---|---|---|
| PART I | Dynamics and Numerics | September 2021 |
| PART II | Physical Parameterization | September 2021 |
| PART III | Data Assimilation | September 2021 |
| PART IV | Implementation Specifics | Not available |
| PART V | Preprocessing (INT2LM) | September 2021 |
| PART VI | Model Output and Data Formats for I/O | September 2021 |
| PART VII | User's Guide | September 2021 |
| Ideal | Idealized simulations | January 2015 |
Part I-III are for the scientific documentation, which is independent of the code itself. In particular, Part VII has a supplementary part, which describes the Feedback File Definition. Below, you will find links to the available documents (in pdf format).
Documents that complement these "official" guides, i.e. reference key model components, can be found in the publications page
DOIs for Documentation of Historic Model Releases
Because some scientific journals now require that all citations in a publication are placed in a long-term storage and do at least contain DOIs, if not peer-reviewed, you can also access the historic documentation for special model releases. Links to these documents can be found below. All documents containing a DOI are marked accordingly.
The documentation containing DOIs can also be found at DWD.
This part of the documentation provides information on the theoretical and numerical formulation of the model covering both the basic thermodynamics and the particular numerical schemes to solve the model equations.
This part of the documentation reviews shorly the basic subgrid-scale physical processes and describes in detail the corresponding parameterization schemes.
The data assimilation part of the documentation describes the full analysis system of the COSMO-package. It is made-up of four components:
Not Available
For operational applications, COSMO is nested in the global models GME (until January 2015) and ICON (starting January 2015) of DWD. Initial and boundary conditions are provided by the pre-processing program INT2LM for analyses and forecasts of GME, ICON or the ECMWF global model IFS. A detailed description of how to work with GME, ICON or IFS data is provided.
This part of the documentation provides information about the output of the COSMO-Model. First, there are the output fields (in GRIB or NetCDF). Besides the prognostic variables several diagnostics are computed in the model and can be written (e.g. 2m-temperature, wind gusts, height of snow melt, etc.). Most atmospheric fields can also be interpolated to p- or z-levels. Another type of output are several ASCII output fields, that are also described. This guide also contains the description of the output from data assimilation (nudging).
In addition, the possible output formats GRIB (1/2) and NetCDF are described briefly.
The user guide of COSMO provides information on code access as well as hardware and software requirements for executing the code. Short tutorials on how to install and run the model are included. The user guide contains a detailed description of all control parameters in the NAMELIST input file. These control parameters allow a flexible set-up of model runs for various applications.
The Feedback File Definition is a supplementary documentation which describes the format of the NetCDF feedobs or feedback file. This file is produced by the data assimilation part of the COSMO model and can be used for LETKF or verification purposes.
This document describes how to set up idealized simulations with COSMO. This mode is useful for researchers doing process studies, but also for model developers when testing new features. The possibilities range from simple 2D flow-over-idealized-hill simulations, 3D idealized convective cell experiments (e.g., Weisman-Klemp-type), LES-like studies with very high spatial resolution to more complex setups using realistic orography and land use.
For each 'component' of a model run (orography, other external parameters, initial (thermo)-dynamic profiles, surface fluxes, model boundary conditions, artificial convection triggers, etc.) there are different choosable options (like a kit with lots of toys), which can be more or less freely combined via extensive namelist parameters.
The documentation is in a draft stage, but you can already find a complete namelist parameter documentation, and the 'cookbook' (together with many exemplary model runscripts in subdirectory RUNSCRIPTS of the code distribution) should get you started.