冬季黑潮延伸体异常增暖对东亚夏季风影响的数值试验

利用NCAR CAM3全球大气环流模式数值试验，研究了冬季黑潮延伸体的海温异常增暖对东亚夏季风的影响。结果表明，冬季黑潮延伸体海温异常增暖将导致东亚夏季风增强北推。表征夏季风强度的EASMI（the East Asian Summer Monsoon Index）和LSTDI（the Land-Sea Thernal Difference Index）在夏季风爆发后都呈现了明显的增强趋势，且LSTDI对海温异常增暖的响应更为敏感。华北、南海和菲律宾以东的低空西南季风显著增强，副热带西风急流轴以北（南）西风加强（减弱）。日本群岛及周边海域和中国东部长江以南至秦岭一线的降水明显减少；华北、南海、东海、黄海和菲律宾以东的西太平洋上的降水增多。华北是东亚夏季风对黑潮延伸体的海温异常响应最敏感的区域。东亚地区近地面温度表现为一致的增温特征，而30～50 °N之间对流层的整体升温导致了海陆热力差异的加大，这是促使东亚夏季风增强的重要原因。中国及周边地区环流和降水异常分布和西北太平洋副热带高压增强北抬有关。     

不同海域SSTA对东半球越赤道气流年代际变化影响的数值模拟研究

采用1950—2000年逐月观测的不同海域（全球、热带外、热带、热带印度洋-太平洋及热带太平洋）海表温度,分别驱动NCAR CAM3全球大气环流模式,进行了多组长时间积分试验,对比ERA-40再分析资料,讨论了这些海域海表温度异常（SSTA）对东半球越赤道气流年代际变化的影响。数值试验结果表明,全球、热带、热带印度洋-太平洋及热带太平洋海表温度变化分别驱动NCAR CAM3全球大气环流模式,均能模拟出索马里、120 ?E和150 ?E越赤道气流在1970年代中后期由弱变强的年代际变化特征,其中模拟的索马里越赤道气流年代际变化特征及其与东亚夏季风年代际变化关系均与观测结果较一致,而热带外海表温度驱动全球大气环流模式未能模拟出此年代际变化现象,表明全球、热带、热带印度洋-太平洋及热带太平洋海表温度变化均对索马里越赤道气流在1970年代中后期的年代际变化具有重要作用,热带太平洋是关键海区;索马里越赤道气流的年代际变化与热带太平洋海温年代际背景变化密切相关,当热带太平洋处于暖（冷）背景年代,热带东太平洋海温异常从北到南呈“＋、－、＋”（“－、＋、－”）“三明治”式距平分布,有利于赤道东太平洋南北两侧产生一对距平反气旋（气旋）,然后可能通过“大气桥”的作用,与热带印度洋赤道南北两侧的一对距平气旋（反气旋）联系起来,从而引起索马里越赤道气流强度的增强（减弱）。      

夏季西北太平洋台风生成数的敏感性因子

比较了台风生成参数中各因子与西北太平洋7-9月台风生成数(WNPSTYN)的相关关系,也比较各因子在北半球台风主要源区的纬向距平分布特征,发现涡度因子与WNPSTYN的关系最好,在台风生成条件中相对富有但不特别富足的特性决定了其是WNPSTYN年际变化的敏感性因子.同时还分析了西北太平洋关键区涡度因子年际变化的来源和表征台风生成数的优越性,发现关键区涡度因子年际变化与南方涛动、南极涛动和澳洲东部高度场的年际变化有关,体现了南半球两大系统和ENSO对WNPSTYN的影响；涡度因子与WNPSTYN的显著相关区与台风生成源地集中区一致,表征台风年际变化有明显的优越性.这些特性对关于WNPSTYN的影响机制研究和气候模式模拟有非常重要的意义.     

Oceanic climatology in the coupled model FGOALS-g2: Improvements and biases

The present study examines simulated oceanic climatology in the Flexible Global Ocean-Atmosphere-Land System model, Grid-point Version 2 (FGOALS-g2) forced by historical external forcing data. The oceanic temperatures and circulations in FGOALS-g2 were found to be comparable to those observed, and substantially improved compared to those simulated by the previous version, FGOALS-g1.0. Compared with simulations by FGOALS-g1.0, the shallow mixed layer depths were better captured in the eastern Atlantic and Pacific Ocean in FGOALS-g2. In the high latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere, the cold biases of SST were about 1°C–5°C smaller in FGOALS-g2. The associated sea ice distributions and their seasonal cycles were more realistic in FGOALS-g2. The pattern of Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) was better simulated in FGOALS-g2, although its magnitude was larger than that found in observed data. The simulated Antarctic Circumpolar Current (ACC) transport was about 140 Sv through the Drake Passage, which is close to that observed. Moreover, Antarctic Intermediate Water (AAIW) was better captured in FGOALS-g2. However, large SST cold biases (>3°C) were still found to exist around major western boundary currents and in the Barents Sea, which can be explained by excessively strong oceanic cold advection and unresolved processes owing to the coarse resolution. In the Indo-Pacific warm pool, the cold biases were partly related to the excessive loss of heat from the ocean. Along the eastern coast in the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, the warm biases were due to overestimation of shortwave radiation. In the Indian Ocean and Southern Ocean, the surface fresh biases were mainly due to the biases of precipitation. In the tropical Pacific Ocean, the surface fresh biases (>2 psu) were mainly caused by excessive precipitation and oceanic advection. In the Indo-Pacific Ocean, fresh biases were also found to dominate in the upper 1000 m, except in the northeastern Indian Ocean. There were warm and salty biases (3°C–4°C and 1–2 psu) from the surface to the bottom in the Labrador Sea, which might be due to large amounts of heat transport and excessive evaporation, respectively. For vertical structures, the maximal biases of temperature and salinity were found to be located at depths of >600 m in the Arctic Ocean, and their values exceeded 4°C and 2 psu, respectively.     

Early-season mapping of crops and cultural operations using very high spatial resolution Pléiades images

The aim of this study was to assess the contribution of very high spatial resolution (VHSR) Pléiades images to both early season crop identification and the mapping of bare soil surface characteristics due to cultural operations. The study region covering 21 km² is located west of the peri-urban territory of the Versailles plain and the Alluets plateau (Yvelines, France). About 100 cropped fields were observed on the ground synchronously with two Pléiades images of 3 and 24 April 2013 and one SPOT4 image of 2 April 2013. The GIS structuring of these field data along with vector information about field boundaries was used for delimitating both training and test zones for the support vector machine classifier with polynomial function kernel (pSVM). The pSVM was computed on the spectral bands and NDVI for both single-date Pléiades and the bi-temporal Pléiades pair. For the single-date classifications of crops, the overall per-pixel accuracy reached 87% for the SPOT4 image of 2 April (6 classes), 79% for the Pléiades image of 3 April (6 classes) and 82% for that of 24 April (7 classes). At the earlier date (2–3 April), the Pléiades image very well discriminated cultural operations (>77%, user’s or producer’s accuracies) as well as fallows and grasslands, while winter cereals and rapeseed were better discriminated by the SPOT4 image winter cereals (>70%, user’s or producer’s accuracies). As Pléiades images revealed within-field spatial variations of early phenological stages of winter cereals that could be critical for adjusting management of zones with delayed development during the growing season, they brought information complementary to multispectral images with high spatial resolution. For the bi-temporal Pléiades image, the overall per-pixel accuracy was about 80% (7 classes), winter crops, grasslands and fallows being very well detected while confusions occurred between spring barley at initial stages (2–3 leaves) and bare soils prepared for other spring crops. Using an additional validation field set covering ∼1/3 of the study area croplands, the crop map resulting from the bi-temporal Pléiades pair achieved correct crop prediction for about 89.7% of the validation fields when considering composite classes for winter cereals and for spring crops. Early-season Pléiades images therefore show a considerable potential for anticipating regional crop patterns and detecting soil tillage operations in spring.     

Two Brazilian archaeological sites investigated by GPR: Serrano and Morro Grande

The application of the ground penetrating radar (GPR) at two archaeological sites, Serrano and Morro Grande, situated in Araruama County, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, aids the study of a prehistoric indigenous culture, associated with the “Tupinambá” that inhabited the region during prehistoric times.The archaeological remains of the study area are mainly characterized by pottery artifacts for several uses, including funerary urns, which were buried within layers of sand and clay. Several profiles were acquired using a RAMAC system, with a 200 and 400 MHz frequency antennae. At the Serrano site, the profiles were acquired around some partially exposed pottery shards, due to sand exploitation. The resultant profiles provided a response model to guide the interpretation of new profiles acquired at other sites in the area, which present similar characteristics.The results showed the great importance of the dielectric permittivity contrast which exists between the targets and the host media, in order for possibly significant features to be identified in radar data.     

Parametrization of the precipitation in the Northern Hemisphere and its verification in Mexico

To improve results in monthly rainfall prediction, a parametrization of precipitation has been developed. The thermodynamic energy equation used in the Adem thermodynamic model (ATM) and the Clausius and Clapeyron equation, were used to obtain a linear parametrization of the precipitation anomalies as a function of the surface temperature and the 700 mb temperature anomalies. The observed rainfall in Mexico over 36 months, from January 1981 to December 1983, was compared with the results obtained of the heat released by condensation, which is proportional to precipitation, using our theoretical formula, and those obtained using a statistical formula, which was derived for the ATM using 12 years of hemispheric real data. The verification using our formula in Mexico, showed better results than the one using the statistical formula.     

Radiative forcing by contrails

A parametric study of the instantaneous radiative impact of contrails is presented using three different radiative transfer models for a series of model atmospheres and cloud parameters. Contrails are treated as geometrically and optically thin plane parallel homogeneous cirrus layers in a static atmosphere. The ice water content is varied as a function of ambient temperature. The model atmospheres include tropical, mid-latitude, and subarctic summer and winter atmospheres. Optically thin contrails cause a positive net forcing at top of the atmosphere. At the surface the radiative forcing is negative during daytime. The forcing increases with the optical depth and the amount of contrail cover. At the top of the atmosphere, a mean contrail cover of 0.1% with average optical depth of 0.2 to 0.5 causes about 0.01 to 0.03 Wm⁻² daily mean instantaneous radiative forcing. Contrails cool the surface during the day and heat the surface during the night, and hence reduce the daily temperature amplitude. The net effect depends strongly on the daily variation of contrail cloud cover. The indirect radiative forcing due to particle changes in natural cirrus clouds may be of the same magnitude as the direct one due to additional cover.     

Analyses of the warm season rainfall climatology of the northeastern US using regional climate model simulations and radar rainfall fields

We examine the warm season (April-September) rainfall climatology of the northeastern US through analyses of high-resolution radar rainfall fields from the Hydro-NEXRAD system and regional climate model simulations using the weather research and forecasting (WRF) model. Analyses center on the 5-year period from 2003 to 2007 and the study area includes the New York-New Jersey metropolitan region covered by radar rainfall fields from the Fort Dix, NJ WSR-88D. The objective of this study is to develop and test tools for examining rainfall climatology, with a special focus on heavy rainfall. An additional emphasis is on rainfall climatology in regions of complex terrain, like the northeastern US, which is characterized by land-water boundaries, large heterogeneity in land use and cover, and mountainous terrain in the western portion of the region. We develop a 5-year record of warm season radar rainfall fields for the study region using the Hydro-NEXRAD system. We perform regional downscaling simulations for the 5-year study period using the WRF model. Radar rainfall fields are used to characterize the interannual, seasonal and diurnal variation of rainfall over the study region and to examine spatial heterogeneity of rainfall. Regional climate model simulations are characterized by a wet bias in the rainfall fields, with the largest bias in the high-elevation regions of the model domain. We show that model simulations capture broad features of the interannual, seasonal, and diurnal variation of rainfall. Model simulations do not capture spatial gradients in radar rainfall fields around the New York metropolitan region and land-water boundaries to the east. The model climatology of convective available potential energy (CAPE) is used to interpret the regional distribution of warm season rainfall and the seasonal and diurnal variability of rainfall. We use hydrologic and meteorological observations from July 2007 to examine the interactions of land surface processes and rainfall from a regional perspective.     

Dynamical Climatology of the Upper Mesosphere, Lower Thermosphere and Ionosphere

The main features of upper atmosphere dynamics as an important part of upper atmosphere climatology are presented. The dynamics of the mesosphere and lower thermosphere (MLT) are of special interest. The results are based on the long series of investigations in East Siberia and data from a world-wide network of observatories. We present the regional climatic norms for the prevailing wind and semi-diurnal tide and the main features of the quasi-periodic structure of the wind field. The non-zonality of MLT dynamics is demonstrated as well as regional differences in the response of the wind field to stratospheric disturbances, solar activity variations and geomagnetic storms.