Interactive comment on “New cloud parameterization with relative dispersion in CAM5.1: model evaluation and impacts on aerosol

General comments: This study examines the behavior of different microphysics schemes used in climate models that take into account the relative dispersion effect in different ways, and explores the sensitivity of the model-simulated cloud and radiation fields to different representations of the dispersion enhancement with increasing aerosols. The results show that the aerosol indirect forcing becomes reduced significantly when incorporating the aerosol-induced increase of the relative dispersion. It is also shown that the reduced magnitude of the indirect forcing depends on choice of the scheme with different sensitivities of the dispersion to droplet number concentration. This is a useful addition to estimates of the aerosol indirect effect, particularly by means of climate modeling. The study is also (at least qualitatively) consistent with a