Abstract:Precipitation structure, microwave brightness temperature and lightning characteristics of five convective precipitation clouds in Nanjing area during 2007—2008 are studied via the precipitation radar, microwave imager and lightning imaging sensor. The result shows that convective precipitation is the main contributor to the precipitation when convective cloud is at developing stage. While at mature or dissipating stage, convective precipitation is changing into stratiform precipitation, and the latter results in a large proportion of the total precipitation.As far as precipitation rate and rain-top-height are concerned, the convective precipitation is quite different from the stratiform one. There exists a negative correlation between microwave brightness temperature and 2 km altitude precipitation rate, so it is possible to infer the near-surface precipitation rate, especially at mature or dissipating stage. Furthermore, the 370 GHz brightness temperature has a better response to the 2 km altitude precipitation rate. At last, precipitation rate at 2 km altitude increases as the lightning times increases.