| 1. |
- Alessandri, Andrea, et al.
(author)
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Multi-scale enhancement of climate prediction over land by increasing the model sensitivity to vegetation variability in EC-Earth
- 2017
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In: Climate Dynamics. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 1432-0894 .- 0930-7575. ; 49:4, s. 1215-1237
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- The EC-Earth earth system model has been recently developed to include the dynamics of vegetation. In its original formulation, vegetation variability is simply operated by the Leaf Area Index (LAI), which affects climate basically by changing the vegetation physiological resistance to evapotranspiration. This coupling has been found to have only a weak effect on the surface climate modeled by EC-Earth. In reality, the effective sub-grid vegetation fractional coverage will vary seasonally and at interannual time-scales in response to leaf-canopy growth, phenology and senescence. Therefore it affects biophysical parameters such as the albedo, surface roughness and soil field capacity. To adequately represent this effect in EC-Earth, we included an exponential dependence of the vegetation cover on the LAI. By comparing two sets of simulations performed with and without the new variable fractional-coverage parameterization, spanning from centennial (twentieth century) simulations and retrospective predictions to the decadal (5-years), seasonal and weather time-scales, we show for the first time a significant multi-scale enhancement of vegetation impacts in climate simulation and prediction over land. Particularly large effects at multiple time scales are shown over boreal winter middle-to-high latitudes over Canada, West US, Eastern Europe, Russia and eastern Siberia due to the implemented time-varying shadowing effect by tree-vegetation on snow surfaces. Over Northern Hemisphere boreal forest regions the improved representation of vegetation cover tends to correct the winter warm biases, improves the climate change sensitivity, the decadal potential predictability as well as the skill of forecasts at seasonal and weather time-scales. Significant improvements of the prediction of 2 m temperature and rainfall are also shown over transitional land surface hot spots. Both the potential predictability at decadal time-scale and seasonal-forecasts skill are enhanced over Sahel, North American Great Plains, Nordeste Brazil and South East Asia, mainly related to improved performance in the surface evapotranspiration.
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| 2. |
- Azorin-Molina, Cesar, et al.
(author)
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Wind speed variability over the Canary Islands, 1948–2014: focusing on trend differences at the land–ocean interface and below–above the trade-wind inversion layer
- 2018
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In: Climate Dynamics. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 0930-7575 .- 1432-0894. ; 50:11-12, s. 4061-4081
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- This study simultaneously examines wind speed trends at the land–ocean interface, and below–above the trade-wind inversion layer in the Canary Islands and the surrounding Eastern North Atlantic Ocean: a key region for quantifying the variability of trade-winds and its response to large-scale atmospheric circulation changes. Two homogenized data sources are used: (1) observed wind speed from nine land-based stations (1981–2014), including one mountain weather station (Izaña) located above the trade-wind inversion layer; and (2) simulated wind speed from two atmospheric hindcasts over ocean (i.e., SeaWind I at 30 km for 1948–2014; and SeaWind II at 15 km for 1989–2014). The results revealed a widespread significant negative trend of trade-winds over ocean for 1948–2014, whereas no significant trends were detected for 1989–2014. For this recent period wind speed over land and ocean displayed the same multi-decadal variability and a distinct seasonal trend pattern with a strengthening (late spring and summer; significant in May and August) and weakening (winter–spring–autumn; significant in April and September) of trade-winds. Above the inversion layer at Izaña, we found a predominance of significant positive trends, indicating a decoupled variability and opposite wind speed trends when compared to those reported in boundary layer. The analysis of the Trade Wind Index (TWI), the North Atlantic Oscillation Index (NAOI) and the Eastern Atlantic Index (EAI) demonstrated significant correlations with the wind speed variability, revealing that the correlation patterns of the three indices showed a spatio-temporal complementarity in shaping wind speed trends across the Eastern North Atlantic.
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| 3. |
- Bao, G, et al.
(author)
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Drought variability in eastern Mongolian Plateau and its linkages to the large‑scale climate forcing
- 2015
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In: Climate Dynamics. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 0930-7575 .- 1432-0894. ; 44:3-4, s. 717-733
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- A robust regional tree-ring chronology with a span of 1819–2009 was developed for the Hulun Buir steppe, China, a region in the eastern edge of the Mongolian Plateau. This chronology exhibited significantly positive correlation with precipitation in June, and negative correlations with temperature from April to September except for May. Highest correlation was found between tree rings and the average April–August standardized precipitation evapotranspiration index (SPEI), suggesting that pines growth strongly respond to the seasonal drought conditions. Accordingly, the average April–August SPEI reconstruction was performed for the period 1854–2009, explaining 45.5 % variance of the calibration period 1953–2009. New reconstruction shows some synchrony with regional-scale events found in other reconstructions to the west Mongolian Plateau. The recent droughts in late 1990 to present are not unusual in the context of the past several centuries. Spectrum analyses suggested that the average April–August SPEI variations, especially severe droughts in the late 1870s-early 1880s, 1920s and since the late 1990s could be associated with large-scale climate forcing, such as the El Niño-Southern Oscillation, the Pacific Decadal Oscillation and the summer North Atlantic Oscillation. Significant teleconnections indicated drought variability during the past several centuries in eastern Mongolian Plateau existed close connections with large-scale synoptic features.
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| 4. |
- Bartlett, Rachel E., et al.
(author)
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Do differences in future sulfate emission pathways matter for near-term climate? A case study for the Asian monsoon
- 2018
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In: Climate Dynamics. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 0930-7575 .- 1432-0894. ; 50:5-6, s. 1863-1880
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Anthropogenic aerosols could dominate over greenhouse gases in driving near-term hydroclimate change, especially in regions with high present-day aerosol loading such as Asia. Uncertainties in near-future aerosol emissions represent a potentially large, yet unexplored, source of ambiguity in climate projections for the coming decades. We investigated the near-term sensitivity of the Asian summer monsoon to aerosols by means of transient modelling experiments using HadGEM2-ES under two existing climate change mitigation scenarios selected to have similar greenhouse gas forcing, but to span a wide range of plausible global sulfur dioxide emissions. Increased sulfate aerosols, predominantly from East Asian sources, lead to large regional dimming through aerosol-radiation and aerosol-cloud interactions. This results in surface cooling and anomalous anticyclonic flow over land, while abating the western Pacific subtropical high. The East Asian monsoon circulation weakens and precipitation stagnates over Indochina, resembling the observed southern-flood-northern-drought pattern over China. Large-scale circulation adjustments drive suppression of the South Asian monsoon and a westward extension of the Maritime Continent convective region. Remote impacts across the Northern Hemisphere are also generated, including a northwestward shift of West African monsoon rainfall induced by the westward displacement of the Indian Ocean Walker cell, and temperature anomalies in northern midlatitudes linked to propagation of Rossby waves from East Asia. These results indicate that aerosol emissions are a key source of uncertainty in near-term projection of regional and global climate; a careful examination of the uncertainties associated with aerosol pathways in future climate assessments must be highly prioritised.
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| 5. |
- Bender, Frida A.-M., et al.
(author)
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Assessment of aerosol-cloud-radiation correlations in satellite observations, climate models and reanalysis
- 2019
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In: Climate Dynamics. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 0930-7575 .- 1432-0894. ; 52:7-8, s. 4371-4392
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Representing large-scale co-variability between variables related to aerosols, clouds and radiation is one of many aspects of agreement with observations desirable for a climate model. In this study such relations are investigated in terms of temporal correlations on monthly mean scale, to identify points of agreement and disagreement with observations. Ten regions with different meteorological characteristics and aerosol signatures are studied and correlation matrices for the selected regions offer an overview of model ability to represent present day climate variability. Global climate models with different levels of detail and sophistication in their representation of aerosols and clouds are compared with satellite observations and reanalysis assimilating meteorological fields as well as aerosol optical depth from observations. One example of how the correlation comparison can guide model evaluation and development is the often studied relation between cloud droplet number and water content. Reanalysis, with no parameterized aerosol–cloud coupling, shows weaker correlations than observations, indicating that microphysical couplings between cloud droplet number and water content are not negligible for the co-variations emerging on larger scale. These observed correlations are, however, not in agreement with those expected from dominance of the underlying microphysical aerosol–cloud couplings. For instance, negative correlations in subtropical stratocumulus regions show that suppression of precipitation and subsequent increase in water content due to aerosol is not a dominating process on this scale. Only in one of the studied models are cloud dynamics able to overcome the parameterized dependence of rain formation on droplet number concentration, and negative correlations in the stratocumulus regions are reproduced.
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| 6. |
- Bollasina, Massimo A., et al.
(author)
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On the link between the subseasonal evolution of the North Atlantic Oscillation and East Asian climate
- 2018
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In: Climate Dynamics. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 0930-7575 .- 1432-0894. ; 51:9-10, s. 3537-3557
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- We analyse the impact of the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) on the climate of East Asia at subseasonal time scales during both winter and summer. These teleconections have mainly been investigated at seasonal and longer time scales, while higher-frequency links are largely unexplored. The NAO is defined using extended empirical orthogonal functions on pentad-mean observations, which allows to elucidate the oscillation’s spatial and temporal evolution and clearly separate the development and decay phases. The downstream dynamical imprint and associated temperature and precipitation anomalies are quantified by means of a linear regression analysis. It is shown that the NAO generates a significant climate response over East Asia during both the dry and wet seasons, whose spatial pattern is highly dependent on the phase of the NAO’s life cycle. Temperature and precipitation anomalies develop concurrently with the NAO mature phase, and reach maximum amplitude 5–10 days later. These are shown to be systematically related to mid and high-latitude teleconnections across the Eurasian continent via eastward-propagating quasi-stationary Rossby waves instigated over the Atlantic and terminating in the northeastern Pacific. These findings underscore the importance of rapidly evolving dynamical processes in governing the NAO’s downstream impacts and teleconnections with East Asia.
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| 7. |
- Brodeau, Laurent, et al.
(author)
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Extinction of the northern oceanic deep convection in an ensemble of climate model simulations of the 20th and 21st centuries
- 2016
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In: Climate Dynamics. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 0930-7575 .- 1432-0894. ; 46:9, s. 2863-2882
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- We study the variability and the evolution of oceanic deep convection in the northern North Atlantic and the Nordic Seas from 1850 to 2100 using an ensemble of 12 climate model simulations with EC-Earth. During the historical period, the model shows a realistic localization of the main sites of deep convection, with the Labrador Sea accounting for most of the deep convective mixing in the northern hemisphere. Labrador convection is partly driven by the NAO (correlation of 0.6) and controls part of the variability of the AMOC at the decadal time scale (correlation of 0.6 when convection leads by 3-4 years). Deep convective activity in the Labrador Sea starts to decline and to become shallower in the beginning of the twentieth century. The decline is primarily caused by a decrease of the sensible heat loss to the atmosphere in winter resulting from increasingly warm atmospheric conditions. It occurs stepwise and is mainly the consequence of two severe drops in deep convective activity during the 1920s and the 1990s. These two events can both be linked to the low-frequency variability of the NAO. A warming of the sub-surface, resulting from reduced convective mixing, combines with an increasing influx of freshwater from the Nordic Seas to rapidly strengthen the surface stratification and prevent any possible resurgence of deep convection in the Labrador Sea after the 2020s. Deep convection in the Greenland Sea starts to decline in the 2020s, until complete extinction in 2100. As a response to the extinction of deep convection in the Labrador and Greenland Seas, the AMOC undergoes a linear decline at a rate of about -0.3 Sv per decade during the twenty-first century.
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| 8. |
- de Vries, Hylke, et al.
(author)
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How Gulf-Stream SST-fronts influence Atlantic winter storms : Results from a downscaling experiment with HARMONIE to the role of modified latent heat fluxes and low-level baroclinicity
- 2019
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In: Climate Dynamics. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 0930-7575 .- 1432-0894. ; 52:9-10, s. 5899-5909
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- The strong horizontal gradients in sea surface temperature (SST) of the Atlantic Gulf Stream exert a detectable influence on extratropical cyclones propagating across the region. This is shown in a sensitivity experiment where 24 winter storms taken from ERA-Interim are simulated with HARMONIE at 10-km resolution. Each storm is simulated twice. First, using observed SST (REF). In the second simulation a smoothed SST is offered (SMTH), while lateral and upper-level boundary conditions are unmodified. Each storm pair propagates approximately along the same track, however their intensities (as measured by maximal near-surface wind speed or 850-hPa relative vorticity) differ up to +/- 25%. A 30-member ensemble created for one of the storms shows that on a single-storm level the response is systematic rather than random. To explain the broad response in storm strength, we show that the SST-adjustment modifies two environmental parameters: surface latent heat flux (LHF) and low-level baroclinicity (B). LHF influences storms by modifying diabatic heating and boundary-layer processes such as vertical mixing. The position of each storm's track relative to the SST-front is important. South of the SST-front the smoothing leads to lower SST, reduced LHF and storms with generally weaker maximum near-surface winds. North of the SST-front the increased LHF tend to enhance the winds, but the accompanying changes in baroclinicity are not necessarily favourable. Together these mechanisms explain up to 80% of the variability in the near-surface maximal wind speed change. Because the mechanisms are less effective in explaining more dynamics-oriented indicators like 850 hPa relative vorticity, we hypothesise that part of the wind-speed change is related to adjustment of the boundary-layer processes in response to the LHF and B changes.
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| 9. |
- Donges, Jonathan F., et al.
(author)
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How complex climate networks complement eigen techniques for the statistical analysis of climatological data
- 2015
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In: Climate Dynamics. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 0930-7575 .- 1432-0894. ; 45:9-10, s. 2407-2424
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Eigen techniques such as empirical orthogonal function (EOF) or coupled pattern (CP)/maximum covariance analysis have been frequently used for detecting patterns in multivariate climatological data sets. Recently, statistical methods originating from the theory of complex networks have been employed for the very same purpose of spatio-temporal analysis. This climate network (CN) analysis is usually based on the same set of similarity matrices as is used in classical EOF or CP analysis, e.g., the correlation matrix of a single climatological field or the cross-correlation matrix between two distinct climatological fields. In this study, formal relationships as well as conceptual differences between both eigen and network approaches are derived and illustrated using global precipitation, evaporation and surface air temperature data sets. These results allow us to pinpoint that CN analysis can complement classical eigen techniques and provides additional information on the higher-order structure of statistical interrelationships in climatological data. Hence, CNs are a valuable supplement to the statistical toolbox of the climatologist, particularly for making sense out of very large data sets such as those generated by satellite observations and climate model intercomparison exercises.
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| 10. |
- Fang, Keyan, et al.
(author)
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An interdecadal climate dipole between Northeast Asia and Antarctica over the past five centuries
- 2019
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In: Climate Dynamics. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 0930-7575 .- 1432-0894. ; 52:1/2, s. 765-775
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- © 2018 Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature Climate models emphasize the need to investigate inter-hemispheric climatic interactions. However, these models often underestimate the inter-hemispheric differences in climate change. With the wide application of reanalysis data since 1948, we identified a dipole pattern between the geopotential heights (GPHs) in Northeast Asia and Antarctica on the interdecadal scale in boreal summer. This Northeast Asia/Antarctica (NAA) dipole pattern is not conspicuous on the interannual scale, probably in that the interannual inter-hemispheric climate interaction is masked by strong interannual signals in the tropics associated with the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO). Unfortunately, the instrumental records are not sufficiently long-lasting to detect the interdecadal variability of the NAA. We thus reconstructed GPHs since 1565, making using the proxy records mostly from tree rings in Northeast Asia and ice cores from Antarctica. The strength of the NAA is time-varying and it is most conspicuous in the eighteenth century and after the late twentieth century. The strength of the NAA matches well with the variations of the solar radiation and tends to increase in along with its enhancement. In boreal summer, enhanced heating associated with high solar radiation in the Northern Hemisphere drives more air masses from the South to the North. This inter-hemispheric interaction is particularly strong in East Asia as a result of the Asian summer monsoon. Northeast Asia and Antarctica appear to be the key regions responsible for inter-hemispheric interactions on the interdecadal scale in boreal summer since they are respectively located at the front and the end of this inter-hemispheric trajectory.
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