From February 15 to 19, 2022, the fourth AISAM Congress (Italian Association of Atmospheric Sciences and Meteorology) took place at the Aula Magna of the University of Milan. This event, aimed at both the scientific community and the public, covered various topics including:
- Atmospheric observations for meteorology, environment, and climate
- Models and operational forecasts at different scales
- Applications and services in atmospheric sciences
- Physical and chemical processes in the atmosphere
- Climate change and environmental impact
- Risk assessment and health effects
- Extreme events
The congress featured numerous presentations on the significant advancements in observational instrumentation. These advancements include both finer details (such as new disdrometers capable of distinguishing various hydrometeors) and higher resolution in defining topographic and chemical-physical characteristics of soil and vegetation, which can positively influence high-resolution modeling developments. Recent, ongoing, or planned efforts towards standardizing procedures and observation formats were also highlighted.
The topic of climate change was naturally present across all sessions, in addition to the specific session dedicated to it. Recurring themes included urban heat islands and “atmospheric rivers”—large-scale structures that transport significant amounts of water vapor and can intensify precipitation events, particularly in flood cases.
ARIANET participated in the congress with an oral presentation titled “Numerical-Logical Combination of Lagrangian Backward Fields to Identify a Source of Noxious Odors Based on Citizen Reports in the NOSE System” and a poster presentation titled “3D-Var/OI Assimilation of Hourly Pollutant Concentration Observations on a European Scale Using the FARM-MINNI Model Operational in CAMS,” which is also available as a short presentation video.