Factors controlling the interannual variations of MJO intensity

The interannual variations of intensity of the Madden-Julian Oscillation (MJO) during boreal winter are investigated by using the observed outgoing longwave radiation (OLR) and the reanalysis data of ECMWF and NCEP. The standard deviation of 20-80-day filtered OLR anomaly is used to measure the MJO intensity. The dominant spatial structure of the interannual variability is revealed by an EOF analysis of the MJO intensity field. It is found that the leading mode is associated with eastern Pacific type ENSO, whereas the second mode is related to central Pacific type ENSO. A simple atmospheric model is used to investigate the relative roles of background moisture and wind changes in affecting the overall strength of MJO. The numerical experiments indicate that the background moisture effect is dominant while the background wind change has a minor effect.     

Influence of coastal wind on surface ozone and nitrogen oxides in suburban Shanghai

Surface ozone, NO, NO₂, and NO _x were measured at a coastal site (Shihua) and a nearby inland site (Zhujing) in suburban Shanghai for the whole year of 2009. More days with ozone pollution in a longer time range were observed at the coastal site than the inland site. The diurnal variations of NO _x concentrations were obviously higher at Zhujing station, while those of ozone concentrations were higher at Shihua station, indicating their different air pollution conditions. Coastal wind has significant influence on the levels and characteristics of the air pollutants. The ozone concentrations during maritime winds (MW) were much higher than those during continental winds (CW) at each of the site, while the NO and NO₂ concentrations were both opposite. The ozone concentrations at Shihua station were much higher than those at Zhujing station, while the NO and NO₂ concentrations were both opposite. The ozone concentrations at both of the two sites showed a distinct “weekend effects” and “weekdays effects” patterns during CW and MW, respectively. Correlation analysis of the pollutants showed that, the compounds during MW were more age than those during CW, and the compounds at Shihua were more age than those at Zhujing. The air pollutions at both of the two sites are mainly associated with the pollutants emitted in this region instead of long range transport.     

Erratum to: Climate change projections over India by a downscaling approach using PRECIS

The author “Bhaski Bhaskaran” and his affiliation “Fujitsu Laboratory of Europe, Middlesex, UK” should be replaced by “Balakrishnan Bhaskaran”, “Fujitsu Laboratories of Europe Limited, Hayes Park, Middlesex, UK”, respectively.The corrected name and affiliation are shown in this erratum.     

A dynamic link between the basin-scale and zonal modes in the Tropical Indian Ocean

Summary The interannual variability of sea surface temperature (SST) anomalies in the tropical Indian Ocean is dominated mainly by a basin-scale mode (BM) and partly by an east–west contrast mode (zonal mode, ZM). The BM reflects the basin-scale warming or cooling and is highly correlated with El Nino with 3- to 6-month lags, while the ZM is marginally correlated with El Nino with 9-month lags.During an El Nino, large-scale anomalous subsidence over the maritime continent occurs as a result of an eastward shift in the rising branch of the Walker circulation suppresses convection over the eastern Indian Ocean, allowing more solar radiation over the eastern Indian Ocean. At the same time, the anomalous southeasterly wind over the equatorial Indian Ocean forces the thermocline over the western Indian Ocean to deepen, especially in the southern part. As a result, SST over the whole basin increases. As El Nino decays, the subsidence over the maritime continent ceases and so does the anomalous southeasterly wind. However, the thermocline perturbation does not quickly shoal back to normal because of inertia and it disperses as Rossby waves. These Rossby waves are reflected back as an equatorial Kelvin wave, causing deepening of the thermocline in the eastern Indian Ocean, and preventing SSTs from cooling in that region. Moreover, the weaker wind speed of the monsoon circulation results in less latent heat loss, and thus warms the eastern Indian Ocean. These two processes therefore help to maintain warm SSTs over the eastern Indian Ocean until fall. During the fall, the warm SST over the eastern Indian Ocean and the cold SST over the western Indian Ocean are enhanced by air–sea interaction and the ZM returns. The ZM dissipates through the seasonal reversal of the monsoon atmospheric circulation and the boundary-reflected Kelvin wave. In the same manner, a basin-scale cooling in the tropical Indian Ocean can induce the ZM warming in the west and cooling in the east.     

Political orientation moderates Americans’ beliefs and concern about climate change

I offer some theoretical insights to help us better understand the moderator effect of political orientation that Larry Hamilton and others have found in recent years. Reflexive modernization theory highlights an emerging tension between those who direct attention to the negative consequences of industrial capitalism such as climate change (e.g., the scientific community and environmental organizations) and those who defend the economic system against such critiques (e.g., the conservative movement). Political divisions in the American public increasingly map onto these societal divisions between critics and defenders of the industrial capitalist order—especially for the issue of climate change. This alignment is facilitated by increased polarization among political elites and balkanization of the news media. Strong evidence of the moderator effect is consistent with the expectations of information processing theory and elite cues hypothesis from political science. Recent empirical findings in political psychology and neuroscience also seem pertinent for explaining this moderator effect. I end by outlining a few implications for climate change research and communication.     

Climate change links fate of glaciers and an endemic alpine invertebrate

Climate warming in the mid- to high-latitudes and high-elevation mountainous regions is occurring more rapidly than anywhere else on Earth, causing extensive loss of glaciers and snowpack. However, little is known about the effects of climate change on alpine stream biota, especially invertebrates. Here, we show a strong linkage between regional climate change and the fundamental niche of a rare aquatic invertebrate—the meltwater stonefly Lednia tumana—endemic to Waterton-Glacier International Peace Park, Canada and USA. L. tumana has been petitioned for listing under the U.S. Endangered Species Act due to climate-change-induced glacier loss, yet little is known on specifically how climate impacts may threaten this rare species and many other enigmatic alpine aquatic species worldwide. During 14 years of research, we documented that L. tumana inhabits a narrow distribution, restricted to short sections (~500 m) of cold, alpine streams directly below glaciers, permanent snowfields, and springs. Our simulation models suggest that climate change threatens the potential future distribution of these sensitive habitats and the persistence of L. tumana through the loss of glaciers and snowfields. Mountaintop aquatic invertebrates are ideal early warning indicators of climate warming in mountain ecosystems. Research on alpine invertebrates is urgently needed to avoid extinctions and ecosystem change.     

How well do integrated assessment models simulate climate change?

Integrated assessment models (IAMs) are regularly used to evaluate different policies of future emissions reductions. Since the global costs associated with these policies are immense, it is vital that the uncertainties in IAMs are quantified and understood. We first demonstrate the significant spread in the climate system and carbon cycle components of several contemporary IAMs. We then examine these components in more detail to understand the causes of differences, comparing the results with more complex climate models and earth system models (ESMs), where available. Our results show that in most cases the outcomes of IAMs are within the range of the outcomes of complex models, but differences are large enough to matter for policy advice. There are areas where IAMs would benefit from improvements (e.g. climate sensitivity, inertia in climate response, carbon cycle feedbacks). In some cases, additional climate model experiments are needed to be able to tune some of these improvements. This will require better communication between the IAM and ESM development communities.     

Diagnostic Analysis of the Quasi-Balanced Flow of a Mesoscale Vortex During the 12 June 2008 Guangxi Rainstorm

By using the high-resolution observation data and MM5 model simulation data, the analysis on the 12 June 2008 Guangxi flash-flood rainstorm shows that the associated major mesoscale weather system of this event is a quasi-stationary mesoscale vortex, which resulted from the interaction between the midlatitude synoptic-scale waves in the westerly belt and the low-latitude warm-moist flow under the terrain effect. The genesis, development, and movement of the mesoscale vortex have significant impacts on the intensity and persistence of the severe precipitation from the Guangxi flash-flood rainstorm. This vortex is characterized by the coexistence of strong vorticity and divergence with the same order of magnitude. Well organized, deep, and moist convection was observed for a long period of time, and was produced by the interaction between the mesoscale vortex and the gravity waves. The latter was generated by the terrain effect and the ageostrophic effect of high winds in the low-level jet. According to the quasi-balanced dynamical theory, quasi-balanced flow must have existed in the mesoscale motions with both divergent and rotational winds. Thus, based on the diagnosis of the quasi-balanced flow, the PV-ωinversion method is employed to analyze the organized moist convection. The results show that 50%-70% of the vertical circulation in the rainstorm areas was quasi-balanced, so the quasi-balanced flow could well reflect features of the strong vertical motions associated with the coexistence of vorticity and divergence during this event.     

Relation of the Second Type Thermal Helicity to Precipitation of Landfalling Typhoons: A Case Study of Typhoon Talim

This study utilized the MM5 mesoscale model to simulate the landfalling process of Typhoon Talim. The simulated typhoon track, weather patterns, and rainfall process are consistent with the observation. Using the simulation results, the relation of the second type thermal helicity (H ₂) to rainfall caused by the landfalling typhoon Talim was analyzed. The results show that H ₂ could well indicate the heavy inland rainfall but it did not perform as well as the helicity in predicting rainfall during the beginning stage of the typhoon landfall. In particular, H ₂ was highly correlated with rainfall of Talim at 1-h lead time. For 1–5-h lead time, it also had a higher correlation with rainfall than the helicity did, and thus showing a better potential in forecasting rainfall intensification. Further analyses have shown that when Talim was in the beginning stage of landfall, 1) the 850–200-hPa vertical wind shear around the Talim center was quite small (about 5 m s⁻¹); 2) the highest rainfall was to the right of the Talim track and in the area with a 300-km radius around the Talim center, exhibiting no obvious relation to low-level temperature advection, low-level air convergence, and upper-level divergence; 3) the low-level relative vorticity reflected the rainfall change quite well, which was the main reason why helicity had a better performance than H ₂ in this period. However, after Talim moved inland further, 1) it weakened gradually and was increasingly affected by the northern trough; 2) the vertical wind shear was enhanced as well; 3) the left side of the down vertical wind shear lay in the Lushan and Dabieshan mountain area, which could have contributed to triggering a secondary vertical circulation, helping to produce the heavy rainfall over there; hence, H ₂ showed a better capacity to reflect the rainfall change during this stage.     

Numerical Considerations for Lagrangian Stochastic Dispersion Models: Eliminating Rogue Trajectories,and the Importance of Numerical Accuracy

When Lagrangian stochastic models for turbulent dispersion are applied to complex atmospheric flows, some type of ad hoc intervention is almost always necessary to eliminate unphysical behaviour in the numerical solution. Here we discuss numerical strategies for solving the non-linear Langevin-based particle velocity evolution equation that eliminate such unphysical behaviour in both Reynolds-averaged and large-eddy simulation applications. Extremely large or ‘rogue’ particle velocities are caused when the numerical integration scheme becomes unstable. Such instabilities can be eliminated by using a sufficiently small integration timestep, or in cases where the required timestep is unrealistically small, an unconditionally stable implicit integration scheme can be used. When the generalized anisotropic turbulence model is used, it is critical that the input velocity covariance tensor be realizable, otherwise unphysical behaviour can become problematic regardless of the integration scheme or size of the timestep. A method is presented to ensure realizability, and thus eliminate such behaviour. It was also found that the numerical accuracy of the integration scheme determined the degree to which the second law of thermodynamics or ‘well-mixed condition’ was satisfied. Perhaps more importantly, it also determined the degree to which modelled Eulerian particle velocity statistics matched the specified Eulerian distributions (which is the ultimate goal of the numerical solution). It is recommended that future models be verified by not only checking the well-mixed condition, but perhaps more importantly by checking that computed Eulerian statistics match the Eulerian statistics specified as inputs.