In situ high-temperature X-ray diffraction and spectroscopic study of fibroferrite,FeOH(SO<Subscript>4</Subscript>)·5H<Subscript>2</Subscript>O

The thermal dehydration process of fibroferrite, FeOH(SO₄)·5H₂O, a secondary iron-bearing hydrous sulfate, was investigated by in situ high-temperature synchrotron X-ray powder diffraction (HT-XRPD), in situ high-temperature Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (HT-FTIR) and thermal analysis (TGA-DTA) combined with evolved gas mass spectrometry. The data analysis allowed the determination of the stability fields and the reaction paths for this mineral as well as characterization of its high-temperature products. Five main endothermic peaks are observed in the DTA curve collected from room T up to 800 °C. Mass spectrometry of gases evolved during thermogravimetric analysis confirms that the first four mass loss steps are due to water emission, while the fifth is due to a dehydroxylation process; the final step is due to the decomposition of the remaining sulfate ion. The temperature behavior of the different phases occurring during the heating process was analyzed, and the induced structural changes are discussed. In particular, the crystal structure of a new phase, FeOH(SO₄)·4H₂O, appearing at about 80 °C due to release of one interstitial H₂O molecule, was solved by ab initio real-space and reciprocal-space methods. This study contributes to further understanding of the dehydration mechanism and thermal stability of secondary sulfate minerals.     

Anisotropic mechanical properties of zircon and the effect of radiation damage

This study provides new insights into the relationship between radiation-dose-dependent structural damage due to natural U and Th impurities and the anisotropic mechanical properties (Poisson’s ratio, elastic modulus and hardness) of zircon. Natural zircon samples from Sri Lanka (see Muarakami et al. in Am Mineral 76:1510–1532, 1991) and synthetic samples, covering a dose range of zero up to 6.8 × 10¹⁸ α-decays/g, have been studied by nanoindentation. Measurements along the [100] crystallographic direction and calculations, based on elastic stiffness constants determined by Özkan (J Appl Phys 47:4772–4779, 1976), revealed a general radiation-induced decrease in stiffness (~54 %) and hardness (~48 %) and an increase in the Poisson’s ratio (~54 %) with increasing dose. Additional indentations on selected samples along the [001] allowed one to follow the amorphization process to the point that the mechanical properties are isotropic. This work shows that the radiation-dose-dependent changes of the mechanical properties of zircon can be directly correlated with the amorphous fraction as determined by previous investigations with local and global probes (Ríos et al. in J Phys Condens Matter 12:2401–2412, 2000a; Farnan and Salje in J Appl Phys 89:2084–2090, 2001; Zhang and Salje in J Phys Condens Matter 13:3057–3071, 2001). The excellent agreement, revealed by the different methods, indicates a large influence of structural and even local phenomena on the macroscopic mechanical properties. Therefore, this study indicates the importance of acquiring better knowledge about the mechanical long-term stability of radiation-damaged materials.     

The impact of boreal autumn SST anomalies over the South Pacific on boreal winter precipitation over East Asia

The possible mechanism behind the variability in the dipole pattern of boreal winter precipitation over East Asia is analyzed in this study. The results show that the SST anomalies(SSTAs) over the South Pacific Ocean(SPO) in boreal autumn are closely related to the variability in the dipole pattern of boreal winter precipitation over East Asia. The physical link between the boreal autumn SPO SSTAs and the boreal winter East Asian precipitation dipole pattern is shown to mainly be the seasonal persistence of the SPO SSTAs themselves. The seasonal persistence of the SPO SSTAs can memorize and transport the signal of the boreal autumn SSTAs to the following winter, and then stimulates a meridional teleconnection pattern from the SH to the NH, resulting in a meridional dipole pattern of atmospheric circulation over East Asia in boreal winter. As a major influencing factor, this dipole pattern of the atmospheric circulation can finally lead to the anomalous precipitation dipole pattern over East Asia in boreal winter. These observed physical processes are further confirmed in this study through numerical simulation. The evidence from this study, showing the impact of the SPO SSTAs in boreal autumn,not only deepens our understanding of the variability in East Asian boreal winter precipitation, but also provides a potentially useful predictor for precipitation in the region.     

Upper-Tropospheric Environment–Tropical Cyclone Interactions over the Western North Pacific: A Statistical Study

Based on 25-year(1987–2011) tropical cyclone(TC) best track data, a statistical study was carried out to investigate the basic features of upper-tropospheric TC–environment interactions over the western North Pacific. Interaction was defined as the absolute value of eddy momentum flux convergence(EFC) exceeding 10 m s~(-1)d~(-1). Based on this definition, it was found that 18% of all six-hourly TC samples experienced interaction. Extreme interaction cases showed that EFC can reach~120 m s~(-1)d~(-1) during the extratropical-cyclone(EC) stage, an order of magnitude larger than reported in previous studies.Composite analysis showed that positive interactions are characterized by a double-jet flow pattern, rather than the traditional trough pattern, because it is the jets that bring in large EFC from the upper-level environment to the TC center. The role of the outflow jet is also enhanced by relatively low inertial stability, as compared to the inflow jet. Among several environmental factors, it was found that extremely large EFC is usually accompanied by high inertial stability, low SST and strong vertical wind shear(VWS). Thus, the positive effect of EFC is cancelled by their negative effects. Only those samples during the EC stage, whose intensities were less dependent on VWS and the underlying SST, could survive in extremely large EFC environments, or even re-intensify. For classical TCs(not in the EC stage), it was found that environments with a moderate EFC value generally below ~25 m s~(-1)d~(-1) are more favorable for a TC's intensification than those with extremely large EFC.     

Preface to the Special Issue “Unified Perspective of Climate Variability and Change”

正Forty years ago,Klaus Wyrtki(1975)of University of Hawaii discovered that El Nino warming off South America is not a result of local wind change but a response to the relaxed equatorial trade winds some 10 000 km away near the international dateline.The Kelvin wave mechanism was quickly verified from wind-forced ocean model simulations.Consequent     

Competing impact of anthropogenic emissions and meteorology on the distribution of trace gases over Indian region

The spatial distribution of trace gases exhibit large spatial heterogeneity over the Indian region with an elevated pollution loading over densely populated Gangetic Plains (IGP). The contending role and importance of anthropogenic emissions and meteorology in deciding the trace gases level and distribution over Indian region, however, is poorly investigated. In this paper, we use an online regional chemistry transport model (WRF/Chem) to simulate the spatial distribution of trace gases over Indian region during one representative month of only three meteorological seasons namely winter, spring/summer and monsoon. The base simulation, using anthropogenic emissions from SEAC⁴RS inventory, is used to simulate the general meteorological conditions and the realistic spatial distribution of trace gases. A sensitivity simulation is conducted after removing the spatial heterogeneity in the anthropogenic emissions, i.e., with spatially uniform emissions to decouple the role of anthropogenic emissions and meteorology and their role in controlling the distribution of trace gases over India. The concentration levels of Ozone, CO, SO₂ and NO₂ were found to be lower over IGP when the emissions are uniform over India. A comparison of the base run with the sensitivity run highlights that meteorology plays a dominant role in controlling the spatial distribution of relatively longer-lived species like CO and secondary species like Ozone while short-lived species like NO_X and SO₂ are predominantly controlled by the spatial variability in anthropogenic emissions over the Indian region.     

Mesoscale numerical simulation study of warm fog dissipation by salt particles seeding

Based on the dynamic framework of WRF and Morrison 2-moment explicit cloud scheme, a salt-seeding scheme was developed and used to simulate the dissipation of a warm fog event during 6–7 November 2009 in the Beijing and Tianjin area. The seeding effect and its physical mechanism were studied. The results indicate that when seeding fog with salt particles sized 80 μm and at a quantity of 6 gm~(-2) at the fog top, the seeding effect near the ground surface layer is negative in the beginning period, and then a positive seeding effect begins to appear at 18 min, with the best effect appearing at 21 min after seeding operation. The positive effect can last about 35 min. The microphysical mechanism of the warm fog dissipation is because of the evaporation due to the water vapor condensation on the salt particles and coalescence with salt particles.The process of fog water coalescence with salt particles contributed mostly to this warm fog dissipation. Furthermore, two series of sensitivity experiments were performed to study the seeding effect under different seeding amounts and salt particles sizes. The results show that seeding fog with salt particles sized of 80 μm can have the best seeding effect, and the seeding effect is negative when the salt particle size is less than 10 μm. For salt particles sized 80 μm, the best seeding effect, with corresponding visibility of 380 m, can be achieved when the seeding amount is 30 g m~(-2).     

Ensemble simulation of land evapotranspiration in China based on a multi-forcing and multi-model approach

In order to reduce the uncertainty of offline land surface model(LSM) simulations of land evapotranspiration(ET), we used ensemble simulations based on three meteorological forcing datasets [Princeton, ITPCAS(Institute of Tibetan Plateau Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences), Qian] and four LSMs(BATS, VIC, CLM3.0 and CLM3.5), to explore the trends and spatiotemporal characteristics of ET, as well as the spatiotemporal pattern of ET in response to climate factors over mainland China during 1982–2007. The results showed that various simulations of each member and their arithmetic mean(Ens Mean) could capture the spatial distribution and seasonal pattern of ET sufficiently well, where they exhibited more significant spatial and seasonal variation in the ET compared with observation-based ET estimates(Obs MTE). For the mean annual ET, we found that the BATS forced by Princeton forcing overestimated the annual mean ET compared with Obs MTE for most of the basins in China, whereas the VIC forced by Princeton forcing showed underestimations. By contrast, the Ens Mean was closer to Obs MTE, although the results were underestimated over Southeast China. Furthermore, both the Obs MTE and Ens Mean exhibited a significant increasing trend during 1982–98; whereas after 1998, when the last big EI Ni ?no event occurred, the Ens Mean tended to decrease significantly between 1999 and 2007, although the change was not significant for Obs MTE. Changes in air temperature and shortwave radiation played key roles in the long-term variation in ET over the humid area of China, but precipitation mainly controlled the long-term variation in ET in arid and semi-arid areas of China.     

The Congo basin zonal overturning circulation

The Gulf of Guinea in the equatorial Atlantic is characterized by the presence of strong subsidence at certain times of the year. This subsidence appears in June and becomes well established from July to September. Since much of theWest African monsoon flow originates over the Gulf, Guinean subsidence is important for determining moisture sources for the monsoon. Using reanalysis products, I contribute to a physical understanding of what causes this seasonal subsidence, and how it relates to precipitation distributions across West Africa.There is a seasonal zonal overturning circulation above the Congo basin and the Gulf of Guinea in the ERA-Interim, ERA-40, NCEP2, and MERRA reanalyses. The up-branch is located in the Congo basin around 20°E. Mid-tropospheric easterly flows constitute the returning-branch and sinking over the Gulf of Guinea forms the down-branch, which diverges at 2°W near the surface, with winds to the east flowing eastward to complete the circulation. This circulation is driven by surface temperature differences between the eastern Gulf and Congo basin. Land temperatures remain almost uniform, around 298 K, throughout a year, but the Guinean temperatures cool rapidly from 294 K in May to about 290 K in August. These temperature changes increase the ocean/land temperature contrast, up to 8 K, and drive the circulation.I hypothesize that when the overturning circulation is anomalously strong, the northward moisture transport and Sahelian precipitation are also strong. This hypothesis is supported by ERA-Interim and PERSIANN-CDR (Precipitation Estimation from Remotely Sensed Information using Artificial Neural Networks-Climate Data Record) data.     

A modeling study of effective radiative forcing and climate response due to tropospheric ozone

This study simulates the effective radiative forcing(ERF) of tropospheric ozone from 1850 to 2013 and its effects on global climate using an aerosol–climate coupled model, BCC AGCM2.0.1 CUACE/Aero, in combination with OMI(Ozone Monitoring Instrument) satellite ozone data. According to the OMI observations, the global annual mean tropospheric column ozone(TCO) was 33.9 DU in 2013, and the largest TCO was distributed in the belts between 30°N and 45°N and at approximately 30°S; the annual mean TCO was higher in the Northern Hemisphere than that in the Southern Hemisphere;and in boreal summer and autumn, the global mean TCO was higher than in winter and spring. The simulated ERF due to the change in tropospheric ozone concentration from 1850 to 2013 was 0.46 W m~(-2), thereby causing an increase in the global annual mean surface temperature by 0.36℃, and precipitation by 0.02 mm d~(-1)(the increase of surface temperature had a significance level above 95%). The surface temperature was increased more obviously over the high latitudes in both hemispheres, with the maximum exceeding 1.4?C in Siberia. There were opposite changes in precipitation near the equator,with an increase of 0.5 mm d~(-1)near the Hawaiian Islands and a decrease of about-0.6 mm d~(-1)near the middle of the Indian Ocean.