Design of a hemispherical shell shaped natural ventilation temperature observation instrument

Atmospheric temperature is fundamental information for various industries, such as production, life, and scientific research. The temperature error induced by the solar rays can reach 1 °C or even higher. A hemispherical shell-shaped atmospheric temperature measuring instrument that can reduce heat pollution and increase air velocity was designed. First, the instrument was optimized using computational fluid dynamics (CFD) software packages. Then, the CFD software packages were employed to quantify the temperature errors of the instrument with varying situations. A neural network model was employed to develop a temperature error correction model that can be targeted for multi-variable changes. This model provides accurate correction data when the influencing factors change continuously. Finally, field experiments were performed. The experimental data analysis indicates that the mean temperature error and the maximum error of the instrument before correction are 0.08 and 0.25 °C, respectively. The root mean square error, the mean absolute error, and the correlation coefficient between measured temperature errors from experiments and corrected temperature errors from the correction model are 0.099, 0.016, and 0.952 °C, respectively. By utilizing a temperature error correction model, the measuring error of the instrument can be minimized to a range between -0.05 and 0.04 °C. Consequently, the instrument is anticipated to enhance temperature measurement accuracy to ∼0.1 °C.