An integrated urban systems model with GIS

The main purpose of this paper is to explore a possible integration for the entire transportation modeling procedure – from data inventory to future demand forecasting – by implementing integrated land use and transportation models with a geographic information system (GIS). In order to make an integrated, procedural modeling system possible, Land Use and Transportation modeling system with GIS (LUTGIS) has been developed and presented in this paper.  There are four sub-systems in LUTGIS: (1) a data inventory system, (2) a traffic analysis zone generation system, (3) an integrated land use and transportation modeling system, and (4) a graphic user interface (GUI) system. Since the main target of this paper is to explore a possible way to create a viable system, LUTGIS integrates currently available and user-friendly computing technologies. For both transportation planners and administrative decision-makers, such an operable system is very desirable for sharing information so they may arrive at a consensus through the use of LUTGIS, an integrated land use and transportation modeling system. Received: 22 October 1998/Accepted 11 July 1999     

Influence of climate change on interannual variation in contaminant body burden in Gulf of Mexico oysters

As part of NOAA's National Status and Trends Mussel Watch Program, oysters were sampled along the Gulf of Mexico coast each winter from 1986 to 1992 and analyzed for trace metal, polynuclear aromatic hydrocarbon (PAH), and pesticide body burden. We identified contaminant variables for which large-scale climate processes played an important role in establishing the interannual variation in body burden by examining cases where body burdens rose or fell more or less in unison over broad geographic regions and distinguished these concordant changes from cases where bays varied independently. Of the 11 metals analyzed, nine had scales of concordancy 100 km. Ni and Se, however, had among the largest scales of concordancy in the study, 1200 km. That is, oyster body burdens in bays as far apart as 1200 km tended to rise and fall in unison from one year to the next. Interannual variations in body burden of organic contaminants had a much stronger regional component. All but two of the 11 organic contaminants had scales of concordancy of 200 km or greater and six exceeded 400 km. Concordancy was strongest either in the southern, northwestern, or north-central Gulf, depending upon the contaminant. For all contaminants, bays tended to vary independently in the northeastern Gulf. For three contaminants, total chlordanes, dieldrin and Cd, regional concordancy may originate from a widespread decrease in use and, therefore, input. These contaminants declined nearly monotonically over the 7 years. For others, including Zn and many of the PAHs and pesticides, the El Niño/Southern Oscillation (ENSO) cycle may be important in establishing the interannual variability in contaminant body burden: (1) ENSO has the geographic scale required; (2) a subtropical influence is required to explain the similarity in interannual variation between south Texas and southern Florida; (3) ENSO-related climate responses in the Gulf follow the southwestern/northeastern trend that would establish the northwestern Gulf focus in concordancy so prominent in many of the contaminants; and (4) deviations in yearly mean body burden from the Gulf-wide mean track the Southern Oscillation Index in some cases.     

Paleoenvironmental changes of the Yellow Sea during the Late Quaternary

 Based on stable isotope data and carbon and sulfur elemental analyses, the sedimentary environment of the Yellow Sea was significantly influenced by the sea level changes during the Late Quaternary. At the low sea level stand when the sea level was lower by 56 m, the salinity of seawater was reduced to about 7.6‰, and the sedimentation rate in the central part of the Yellow Sea was three times higher than the present rate. The high C/S ratio during the low sea level stand is strong evidence that sedimentation took place in a lower salinity environment than exists at present. Received: 25 September 1997 / Revision reveived: 15 June 1998     

Microbial Diversity of Deep-sea Sediments from Three Newly Discovered Hydrothermal Vent Fields in the Central Indian Ridge

Since the discovery of hydrothermal vents in the late 1970s, deep-sea hydrothermal vent fields have attracted great attention as biological hotspots. However, compared with other ocean ridges, the structure and function of microbial communities inhabiting vent fields in the Central Indian ridge (CIR) remain understudied. Here, we provide for the first time 16S rRNA gene-based comparative metagenomic analysis of the sediment-associated microbial communities from three newly discovered vent fields in the CIR. Sediment samples collected in the Invent B, Invent E and Onnuri vent fields varied in geochemical properties, elemental concentrations and associated microbial communities. Proteobacteria (Gammaproteobacteria) was the dominant phylum in Invent B and Onnuri vent fields. In contrast, Invent E mainly consisted of Chloroflexi and Euryarchaeota. Predicted functional profiling revealed that the microbial communities in the three vents are dominated by chemoheterotrophic functions. In addition, microbial communities capable of respiration of sulfur compounds, nitrification, nitrite oxidation, methylotrophy, and methanotropy were found to be the main chemolithoautotrophs. Compared to other vent fields, Invent E showed a predominance of archaeal methanogens suggesting it exhibits slightly different geochemistry. Multivariate analysis indicated that the biogeochemical and trace metal differences are reflected in the sediment microbial compositions of the three vent fields. This study expands our current understanding of the microbial community structure and potential ecological functions of the newly discovered hydrothermal vent fields in the CIR.

     

Quantitative analysis of Arctic ice flow acceleration with increasing temperature

This study explores the ice flow acceleration(21.1%) of Pedersenbreen during 2016–2017 after the extremely warm winter throughout the whole Arctic in 2015/2016 using in situ data and quantitatively analyses the factors contributing to this acceleration. Several data sets, including 2008–2018 air temperature data from Ny-?lesund,ten-year in situ GPS measurements and Elmer/Ice ice flow modelling under different ice temperature scenarios,suggest that the following factors contributed to the ice flow acceleration: the softened glacier ice caused by an increase in the air temperature(1.5℃) contributed 2.7%–30.5%, while basal lubrication contributed 69.5%–97.3%.The enhanced basal sliding was mostly due to the increased surface meltwater penetrating to the bedrock under the rising air temperature conditions; consequently, the glacier ice flow acceleration was caused mainly by an increase in subglacial water. For Pedersenbreen, there was an approximately one-year time lag between the change in air temperature and the change in glacier ice flow velocity.     

On Climate Variations and Changes Observed in South Korea

This study describes observations on possible climate changes occurring on the Korean Peninsula. We found that in large urban and industrial areas in Korea, there has been a significant increase in the annual mean temperatures according to data of the past 29 years. The increase in January temperatures was in the order of 0.8 ～ 2.4 ° C. However, in rural and marine stations, the increase in annual mean temperature was 0.6 ° C; the level of the global average. There was also an increase in precipitation: 259 mm over the recent 97 years. Observation has revealed that a month-long steady rainfall in late June and July with a quasi-stationary polar front has not occurred in recent years and has been replaced with scattered convective heavy-showers on a local scale in July and August. It is observed that the behaviour of this rainy front, `the Changma front' has brought changes to rainfall characteristics. Our results highlight the importance of the shortened rainy season. However, the amount of rainfall and the number of heavy rainfall days have increased.     

Atmospheric Mercury Concentrations from Several Observatory Sites in the Northern Hemisphere

In an effort to investigate both large-scale (spatial) and short/long-term (temporal) distribution characteristics of atmospheric mercury, we have combined and analyzed the Hg concentration data sets collected continuously by four different scientific groups for the areas and periods covering (1) America (three sites near the Canadian Great Lakes (CGL): 1997–2000), (2) Asia (Seoul, Korea (SEL): 1997–2002), (3) Arctic (Alert, Canada (ALT): 1995–2001), and (4) Europe (Mace Head, Ireland (MH): 1996–2002). The mean concentrations of Hg data from those widely dispersed monitoring stations were computed to be (1) 1.58 ± 0.23, 1.69 ± 0.32, and 1.93 ± 0.44 (three sites in CGL), (2) 5.06 ± 2.46 ng m^–3 (SEL), (3) 1.55 ± 0.41 (ALT), and (4) 1.76 ± 0.31 (MH). Intersite relationships were investigated among all different stations using the data groups divided into different temporal intervals. The analysis of diurnal variation patterns of Hg indicated differences in regional source/sink characteristics, with increasing amplitudes of variability toward areas under the strong influence of anthropogenic sources. When the analysis was made over different seasons, the patterns contrasted greatly between the Arctic and the other areas. It was found that the relative enhancement of Hg concentrations was dominant during winter/spring in most areas due to direct or indirect influences of anthropogenic emissions. However, the pattern for the Arctic area was distinguished pronouncedly from others with the spring minimum and summer maximum both of which reflect the potent effects of mercury depletion phenomenon (MDP). By contrast, no long-term trend, either being an increase or decrease, was evident from any of the stations during each respective study period. Although our initial attempts to examine the distribution characteristics of Hg analyzed by different scientific groups were successful, we feel that these efforts should be continued further to extend the compatibility of the global database of Hg.     

Possible influence of western North Pacific monsoon on TC activity in mid-latitudes of East Asia

The interannual variation of East Asia summer monsoon (EASM) rainfall exhibits considerable differences between early summer [May–June (MJ)] and peak summer [July–August (JA)]. The present study focuses on peak summer. During JA, the mean ridge line of the western Pacific subtropical High (WPSH) divides EASM domain into two sub-domains: the tropical EA (5°N–26.5°N) and subtropical-extratropical EA (26.5°N–50°N). Since the major variability patterns in the two sub-domains and their origins are substantially different, the Part I of this study concentrates on the tropical EA or Southeast Asia (SEA). We apply the predictable mode analysis approach to explore the predictability and prediction of the SEA peak summer rainfall. Four principal modes of interannual rainfall variability during 1979–2013 are identified by EOF analysis: (1) the WPSH-dipole sea surface temperature (SST) feedback mode in the Northern Indo-western Pacific warm pool associated with the decay of eastern Pacific El Niño/Southern Oscillation (ENSO), (2) the central Pacific-ENSO mode, (3) the Maritime continent SST-Australian High coupled mode, which is sustained by a positive feedback between anomalous Australian high and sea surface temperature anomalies (SSTA) over Indian Ocean, and (4) the ENSO developing mode. Based on understanding of the sources of the predictability for each mode, a set of physics-based empirical (P-E) models is established for prediction of the first four leading principal components (PCs). All predictors are selected from either persistent atmospheric lower boundary anomalies from March to June or the tendency from spring to early summer. We show that these four modes can be predicted reasonably well by the P-E models, thus they are identified as the predictable modes. Using the predicted PCs and the corresponding observed spatial patterns, we have made a 35-year cross-validated hindcast, setting up a bench mark for dynamic models’ predictions. The P-E hindcast prediction skill represented by domain-averaged temporal correlation coefficient is 0.44, which is twice higher than the skill of the current dynamical hindcast, suggesting that the dynamical models have large rooms to improve. The maximum potential attainable prediction skills for the peak summer SEA rainfall is also estimated and discussed by using the PMA. High predictability regions are found over several climatological rainfall centers like Indo-China peninsula, southern coast of China, southeastern SCS, and Philippine Sea.     

Mechanism of Kelvin and Rossby waves during ENSO events

Summary ?The fields of sea-level height anomaly (SLHA) and surface zonal wind anomaly (SZWA) have been analyzed to investigate the typical evolution of spatial patterns during El Ni?o-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) events. Sea surface temperature (SST) changes during ENSO events are represented as an irregular interplay of two dominant modes, low-frequency mode and biennial mode. Cyclostationary principal component (PC) time series of the former variables are regressed onto the PC time series of the two dominant SSTA modes to find the spatial patterns of SLHA and SZWA consistent with the two SSTA modes. The two regressed patterns of SLHA explain a large portion of SLHA total variability. The reconstruction of SLHA using only the two components reasonably depicts major ENSO events. Although the low-frequency component of SST variability is much larger than the biennial component, the former does not induce strong Kelvin and Rossby waves. The biennial mode induces much stronger dynamical ocean response than the low-frequency mode. Further decomposition of the SLHA modes into Kelvin and Rossby components shows how these two types of equatorial waves evolve during typical ENSO events. The propagation and reflection of these waves are clearly portrayed in the regressed patterns leading to a better understanding of the wave mechanism in the tropical Pacific associated with ENSO. A close examination suggests that the delayed action oscillator hypothesis is generally consistent with the analysis results reported here. Rossby wave development in the central Pacific in the initiation stage of ENSO and the subsequent reflection of Kelvin waves at the western boundary seems to be an important mechanism for further development of ENSO. The development of Kelvin waves forced by the surface wind in the far-western Pacific cannot be ruled out as a possible mechanism for the growth of ENSO. While Kelvin waves in the far-western Pacific serve as an intiation mechanism of ENSO, they also cause the termination of existing ENSO condition in the central and eastern Pacific, thereby leading to a biennial oscillation over the tropical Pacific. The Kelvin waves from the western Pacific erode the thermocline structure in the central Pacific preventing further devlopment of ENSO and ultimately terminating it. It should be emphasized that this wave mechanism is clear and active only in the biennial mode. Received August 15, 2001; revised March 6, 2002     

Effects of Resolution,Cumulus Parameterization Scheme,and Probability Forecasting on Precipitation Forecasts in a High-Resolution Limited-Area Ensemble Prediction System

This study investigates the effects of horizontal resolution, cumulus parameterization scheme (CPS), and probability forecasting on precipitation forecasts over the Korean Peninsula from 00 UTC 15 August to 12 UTC 14 September 2013, using the limited-area ensemble prediction system (LEPS) of the Korea Meteorological Administration. To investigate the effect of resolution, the control members of the LEPS with 1.5- and 3-km resolution were compared. Two 3-km experiments with and without the CPS were conducted for the control member, because a 3-km resolution lies within the gray zone. For probability forecasting, 12 ensemble members with 3-km resolution were run using the LEPS. The forecast performance was evaluated for both the whole study period and precipitation cases categorized by synoptic forcing. The performance of precipitation forecasts using the 1.5-km resolution was better than that using the 3-km resolution for both the total period and individual cases. The result of the 3-km resolution experiment with the CPS did not differ significantly from that without it. The 3-km ensemble mean and probability matching (PM) performed better than the 3-km control member, regardless of the use of the CPS. The PM complemented the defect of the ensemble mean, which better predicts precipitation regions but underestimates precipitation amount by averaging ensembles, compared to the control member. Further, both the 3-km ensemble mean and PM outperformed the 1.5-km control member, which implies that the lower performance of the 3-km control member compared to the 1.5-km control member was complemented by probability forecasting.