Trends in northern midlatitude atmospheric wave power from 1950 to 2099

In a warming climate, atmospheric wave activity and associated weather patterns may change, although conflicting results have been reported on this topic. Additionally, atmospheric wave changes in a future climate have mainly focused on waves of a specified spatial scale, rather than a particular spatiotemporal scale. Here, changes in the variability of Rossby waves of multiple spatiotemporal scales are analyzed using the wavenumber-frequency power spectrum, a tool commonly applied to analyze atmospheric equatorial waves. Daily 500 hPa geopotential height data over 40°–60°N from historical (1950–2005) and future (2006–2099) simulations from 20 models in the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 5 (CMIP5) under the RCP8.5 scenario were analyzed. When compared to the historical period, the late 21st century climate projections showed a decline in spectral power for both eastward and westward propagating waves with wavenumbers greater than 8 that spanned over all frequencies in all seasons, but an increase in mean power for eastward propagating waves with wavenumbers 1–7 over all frequencies was shown in winter and spring. This increase in power was accompanied by increased variance, i.e., an increased meridional extent of 500 hPa ridges and troughs, and was the result of increases in the mean number of high amplitude events and duration of activity within this wave band. These results indicate that large-scale (~ 104 km) eastward propagating weather systems may intensify with higher amplitudes for ridges and troughs, while short-scale (102–103 km) weather systems may decrease in their intensity due to reduced variability in the late 21st century under the high emissions scenario. Potential mechanisms for these changes are discussed, including enhanced Arctic warming and midlatitude-tropical interactions.     

Improved methods for estimating equilibrium climate sensitivity from transient warming simulations

Climate Dynamics - Equilibrium climate sensitivity (ECS) refers to the total global warming caused by an instantaneous doubling of atmospheric CO2 from the pre-industrial level in a climate system....     

2017年8月萍乡地区连续性雷暴大风过程分析

利用常规观测资料、探空资料、多普勒天气雷达基本产品及导出产品,分析了2017年8月中旬萍乡地区雷暴大风天气过程,并选取了其中最强的一次过程进行了细致的分析。结果表明,“北低槽、南副高”的环流形势是此次长时间雷暴大风的环流背景,萍乡受“上下一致”的西南急流控制,中低层切变线、西南急流导致了强对流不稳定;低层逆温、“上干冷、下暖湿”以及风垂直切变的垂直结构,为雷暴大风的产生提供了层结条件和能量条件;地面热低压和地面辐合线、干线等是此次雷暴大风的触发机制。飑线过境,气象要素变化剧烈,在“人”字形回波附近,回波断裂处等区域容易产生强雷暴大风天气。强回波高度迅速下降、拖曳作用、动量下传、中层干暖空气的夹卷及蒸发作用、一定强度的中层径向辐合等多种因素导致了此次地面大风。垂直累积液态含水量、最大反射率因子、风暴顶高的持续下降,对地面大风天气的预报具有一定的指示意义。     

江西省森林和植被碳汇价值研究

江西生态优势明显,森林覆盖率居全国前列,研究植被生态系统碳汇价值是应对气候变化和生态文明建设的具体体现。基于森林资源清查资料,研究了2001—2016年江西省森林碳汇价值;基于卫星遥感数据反演获取植被生态系统净初级生产力(NPP),评估了2000—2016年江西各设区市(县)植被碳汇分布特征。结果表明:1)2016年江西省森林碳储量价值为980.30亿元,植被和森林碳汇价值均呈上升趋势。2)江西省植被碳汇价值增加率为4.55亿元/a,2016年约为823.53亿元,每公顷所创造的碳汇经济价值为4930.67元,比2000年增加了11%。3)2016年各设区市植被碳汇价值排名前三位的分别是赣州、吉安和上饶,排名后三位的是新余、鹰潭和萍乡,单位面积固碳价值排名前三位的为赣州、吉安和抚州,排名后三位的是南昌、九江和鹰潭,其排名与森林面积和森林覆盖率有较大关系。     

The influence of the inter-decadal Pacific oscillation on US precipitation during 1923–2010

Precipitation over the contiguous United States exhibits large multi-decadal oscillations since the early twentieth century, and they often lead to dry (e.g., 1946–1976 and 1999-present) and wet (e.g., 1977–1998) periods and apparent precipitation trends (e.g., from the 1950s to 1990s) over most of the western and central US. The exact cause of these inter-decadal variations is not fully understood. Using observational and reanalysis data and model simulations, this paper examines the influence of the Inter-decadal Pacific Oscillation (IPO) on US precipitation. The IPO is a leading mode of sea surface temperatures (SSTs) seen mostly in the Pacific Ocean. It is found that decadal precipitation variations over much of the West and Central US, especially the Southwest, closely follow the evolution of the IPO (r = 0.85 during 1923–2010 for the Southwest US), and the dry and wet periods are associated, respectively, with the cold and warm phases of the IPO. In particular, the apparent upward trend from the 1950s–1990s and the dry decade thereafter in precipitation over much of the West and Central US are largely caused by the IPO cycles, which switched to a warm phase around 1977 and back to a cold phase around 1999. An atmospheric model forced with observed SSTs reproduces much of this association of US precipitation with the IPO (r = 0.95 between smoothed observed and simulated Southwest US precipitation during 1950–2009 and r = 0.88 between the simulated Southwest US precipitation and the IPO). Atmospheric reanalysis and model data both show a strong high (low) pressure center and anti-cyclonic (cyclonic) anomaly circulation over the North Pacific in the lower troposphere during cold (warm) phases of the IPO, which lead to dry and cold northwesterly and northerly winds and below-normal precipitation over much of the West US during IPO cold periods. The IPO induced changes are most pronounced during the boreal cold season. The results reinforce the notion that tropical Pacific SSTs (and the accompanying SST anomalies in the North Pacific) have large impacts on US precipitation and highlight the need to understand and simulate the IPO for decadal prediction of US precipitation.     

Tail Emission from a Ring-like Jet: Its Application to Shallow Decays of Early Afterglows and GRB 050709

Similar to the case of pulsars the magnetic axis and the spin axis of gamma-ray burst sources may not lie on the same line. This may cause the formation of a ring-like jet due to collimation of the processing magnetic axis. We analyze the tail emission from such a jet, and find that it has a shallow decay phase with a temporal index of -1/2 if the Lorentz factor of the ejecta is not very high, which is consistent with the shallow decay phase of some early X-ray afterglow detected by Swift. The ring-like jet has a tail cusp with sharp rising and very sharp decay. This effect can provide an explanation for the re-brightening and sharp decay of the X-ray afterglow of GRB 050709.     

The Large-Scale, Decelerating X-ray Jets from the Microquasar Xte J1550−564: Evidence for External Shocks Caused by the Jet-Ism Interaction?

Large-scale, decelerating, relativistic X-ray jets from microquasar XTE J1550−564 has been recently discovered with Chandra by Corbel et al. (2002). We find that the dynamical evolution of the approaching jet at the late time is consistent with the well-known Sedov evolutionary phase R∝ t ^2/5. A trans-relativistic external shock dynamic model by analogy with the evolution of gamma-ray burst remnants, is shown to be able to fit the proper-motion data of the approaching jet reasonably well. The inferred interstellar medium density around the source is well below the canonical value n _ISM∼1 cm⁻³. The rapidly fading X-ray emission can be interpreted as synchrotron radiation from the non-thermal electrons in the adiabatically expanding ejecta. These electrons were accelerated by the reverse shock (moving back into the ejecta) which becomes important when the inertia of the swept external matter leads to an appreciable slowing down of the original ejecta.     

广义相对论效应对脉冲星γ射线辐射的影响

本文研究了广义相对论效应和量子力学效应对中子量γ射线辐射的影响．通过选择磁偶极矩以及观察者视线与磁轴之间的夹角这两个观测量作为参量，我们数值计算了从中子星表面发射的、传播方向沿着磁场的光子的逃逸能量．我们得到，在磁偶极矩较小时，量子力学效应不重要，而广义相对论效应使逃逸能量显著降低；当磁偶极矩很大时，两个效应几乎相抵消，光子的逃逸能量几乎不受它们的影响．我们讨论这些结果在脉冲星γ射线谱上的意义．     

Estimates of AGN Black Hole Mass and Minimum Variability Timescale

Black hole mass is one of the fundamental physical parameters of active galactic nuclei (AGNs), for which many methods of estimation have been proposed. One set of methods assumes that the broad-line region (BLR) is gravitationally bound by the central black hole potential, so the black hole mass can be estimated from the orbital radius and the Doppler velocity. Another set of methods assumes the observed variability timescale is determined by the orbital timescale near the innermost stable orbit around the Schwarzschild black hole or the Kerr black hole, or by the characteristic timescale of the accretion disk. We collect a sample of 21 AGNs, for which the minimum variability timescales have been obtained and their black hole masses (Mσ) have been well estimated from the stellar velocity dispersion or the BLR size-luminosity relation. Using the minimum variability timescales we estimated the black hole masses for 21 objects by the three different methods, the results are denoted by Ms, Mk and Md, respectively. We compared each of them with Mσindividually and found that: (1) using the minimum variability timescale with the Kerr black hole theory leads to small differences between Mσand Mk, none exceeding one order of magnitude, and the mean difference between them is about 0.53 dex; (2) using the minimum variability timescale with the Schwarzschild black hole theory leads to somewhat larger difference between Mσand Ms: larger than one order of magnitude for 6 of the 21 sources, and the mean difference is 0.74 dex; (3) using the minimum variability timescale with the accretion disk theory leads to much larger differences between Mσand Md, for 13 of the 21 sources the differences are larger than two orders of magnitude; and the mean difference is as high as about 2.01 dex.