Abstract

The hypothesis that Peruvian stratocumulus play an important role on both the annual mean and annual variations of sea surface temperature (SST) in the eastern equatorial Pacific is examined. The problem is addressed by performing sensitivity experiments using the University of California, Los Angeles, coupled atmosphere–ocean GCM with different idealized temporal variations of stratocumulus in a region along the coast of Peru.

The results obtained are consistent with the notion that Peruvian stratocumulus are a key component of the interhemispherically asymmetric features that characterize the annual mean climate of the eastern equatorial Pacific, including the cold SSTs off Peru and the absence of a southern ITCZ. The principal new finding of this study is that the annual variations (i.e., deviations from the annual mean) of Peruvian stratocumulus are linked to the differences between the amplitude, duration, and westward propagation of the warm and cold phases of the equatorial cold tongue. In the model’s context, only if the prescribed annual variations of Peruvian stratocumulus have the same phase as the observed variations are those differences successfully captured.

The impact of Peruvian stratocumulus on equatorial SST involves “dynamical” and “thermal” effects. The former develop through an enhancement of the northerly component of the surface wind from the Peruvian coast to the equator. The thermal effects develop through the special relationships between SST and surface evaporation over the equatorial cold tongue, which contributes to extend the cold phase until the end of the year. A successful portrayal of this behavior requires a realistic simulation of the annual variations of surface wind over the equatorial cold tongue.

Abstract

Basic issues regarding upper-level frontogenesis addressed in this paper are: (i) simulated frontogenesis influenced by the initial flow, (ii) upper-level frontogenesis as essentially a two-dimensional process, and (iii) frontal-scale positive feedback between vertical advection of momentum and vorticity advection by the ageostrophic wind, which is important for the intensification of upper-level frontal zones. The methodology for investigation is based on analysis of simulated upper-level frontogenesis with a three-dimensional primitive-equation model. The model is a simplified version of the UCLA GCM, with 21 layers in the vertical, horizontal resolution of 1.2° lat × 1.5° long; a 60° sector of one hemisphere as periodic domain, and physics reduced to horizontal diffusion and dry convective adjustment. Simulations initialized with jet streams symmetric about the latitude of maximum wind at each pressure level produce—in the middle troposphere—the strongest frontal zones downstream of the trough of growing baroclinic waves. Strongest upper-level frontal zones originating upstream of the wave trough, as observed, are produced when initial jet streams and perturbations are chosen so that the growing waves have small meridional phase tilt in the initial stages.

In the simulations, tilting associated with divergence of the across-jet ageostrophic flow is the dominant frontogenetical process upstream of the wave trough. Further, tilting associated with divergence of the ageostrophic wind along the jet also contributes to frontogenesis, but to a lesser extent. The former result is similar to that obtained with two-dimensional models in which frontogenetical vertical motions are associated with divergence of the ageostrophic wind across the front.

No definitive evidence is found proving that the simulated frontogenesis is enhanced by a positive-feedback process involving vertical advection of momentum and vorticity advection by the ageostrophic wind. It is found, however, that both of these processes are nonnegligible contributors to the frontal intensification.

Abstract

The stability of baroclinic flows with horizontal shear over sloping topography is analyzed with special emphasis on the structure and energetics of the unstable perturbatiorts. The study is conducted by using a linearized two-layer quasi-geostrophic channel model for different topography profiles and distributions of the basic velocity field. Interactions between the two fluid layers and the energy conversions by the unstable porturbations are described. It is found that topography sloping as (opposed to) the fluid interface contributes to enhance the perturbation amplitude in the upper (lower) layer relative to the lower (upper) layer. The results for bottom topography with dithering characteristics across the flow indicate pronounced localized effects on the energy conversions over the slopes and the meridional scale of the perturbations in the lower layer.

Abstract

This paper examines the records of streamflow during the period 1901–95 corresponding to four major rivers in southeastern South America: Uruguay, Negro, Paraná, and Paraguay. The emphasis is on the detection of long-term trends in the records. The authors demonstrate that the 30-yr running averaged streamflows increased after the mid-1960s at a rate that is approximately linear but not the same in all rivers. There seems to be a tendency toward leveling off in the most recent values. The increased streamflow is consistent with a significant decrease in the amplitude of the seasonal cycle in all rivers, except in the Negro River. An analysis of the sea surface temperature in the eastern equatorial Pacific Ocean suggests that an important component of such an increase in streamflows is consistent with a large-scale and low-frequency variability of the climate system.

Abstract

The impact of ocean-state estimates generated by the consortium for Estimating the Circulation and Climate of the Ocean (ECCO) on the initialization of a coupled general circulation model (CGCM) for seasonal climate forecasts is examined. The CGCM consists of the University of California, Los Angeles, Atmospheric GCM (UCLA AGCM) and an ECCO ocean configuration of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology GCM (MITgcm). The forecasts correspond to ensemble seasonal hindcasts for the period 1993–2001. For the forecasts, the ocean component of the CGCM is initialized in either early March or in early June using ocean states provided either by an unconstrained forward ocean integration of the MITgcm (the “baseline” hindcasts) or by data-constrained ECCO results (the “ECCO” hindcasts). Forecast skill for both the baseline and the ECCO hindcasts is significantly higher than persistence and compares well with the skill of other state-of-the art CGCM forecast systems. For March initial conditions, the standard errors of sea surface temperature (SST) anomalies in ECCO hindcasts (relative to observed anomalies) are up to 1°C smaller than in the baseline hindcasts over the central and eastern equatorial Pacific (150°–120°W). For June initial conditions, the errors of ECCO hindcasts are up to 0.5°C smaller than in the baseline hindcasts. The smaller standard error of the ECCO hindcasts is, in part, due to a more realistic equatorial thermocline structure of the ECCO initial conditions. This study confirms the value of physically consistent ocean-state estimation for the initialization of seasonal climate forecasts.

Abstract

This paper examines the impact of orographically induced mesoscale heterogeneities on the macroscopic behavior of planetary boundary layer (PBL) stratiform clouds, and implements and tests a physically based parameterization of this effect in the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), atmospheric general circulation model (AGCM). The orographic variance and associated thermal circulations induce inhomogeneities in the cloud field that can significantly alter the PBL evolution; an effect that has been largely ignored in existing climate models. The impact of this effect on AGCM simulations is examined and the mechanisms at work are studied by analyzing a series of Cloud System Resolving Model (CSRM) simulations.

Both the CSRM and AGCM results show that, in the absence of the orographic effect, the continental PBL tends to be in one of two regimes: the solid regime characterized by a cold and overcast PBL and the broken regime characterized by a low time-mean cloud incidence and a large-amplitude diurnal cycle. Without the orographic effect, the PBL may lock in the convectively stable solid regime, with deep convection displaced to the surrounding oceans and subsidence induced over land further contributing to the persistence of the cloud deck. The inclusion of the orographic effect weakens the feedback between the cloud's albedo and the ground temperature responsible for the existence of the two regimes and, therefore, conspires against the persistence of the solid regime rendering the behavior of the PBL–ground system less bimodal. The parameterization featured in this paper also increases the amplitude of the diurnal cycle in the AGCM and reduces the excessive seasonality in PBL cloud incidence, resulting in an improved simulation of convective precipitation over regions where the solid regime was spuriously dominating.

Abstract

The existence of a significant simultaneous correlation between bimonthly mean precipitation anomalies over southeastern South America (SESA) and either the first or the second (depending on season) leading mode of interannual variability of upper-level wind over South America (SA) is demonstrated during all seasons except winter. The pattern associated with these modes of variability is similar during all seasons and consists of a continental-scale vortex centered over the eastern coast of subtropical SA. The vortex has a quasi-barotropic structure during all seasons, and its variability modifies moisture transport from the South American low-level jet and the western tropical Atlantic to SESA thus creating precipitation anomalies in this region. During spring (October–November) and summer (January–February) the circulation creates a second center of precipitation anomalies over the South Atlantic convergence zone that are of opposite sign to those over SESA, while during fall (April–May) precipitation anomalies are primarily confined to SESA. On the basis of the correlation between upper-level winds and precipitation, an empirical method to produce long-range forecasts of bimonthly mean precipitation over SESA is developed. Method tests in hindcast mode for the period 1959–2001 show a potential for reliable predictions during the southern spring, summer, and fall. The method is further tested in an experimental mode by using Development of a European Multimodel Ensemble System for Seasonal-to-Interannual Prediction (DEMETER) wind hindcasts. Forecasts obtained in this way are skillful during spring only, with highest skill during El Niño–Southern Oscillation years. During summer and fall, the DEMETER forecasts of wind anomalies limit the method’s ability to make reliable real predictions.

Abstract

Simulations with the UCLA atmospheric general circulation model (AGCM) using two different global sea surface temperature (SST) datasets for January 1979 are compared. One of these datasets is based on COADS (SSTs) at locations where there are ship reports, and climatology elsewhere; the other is derived from measurements by instruments onboard NOAA satellites. In the former dataset (COADS SST), data are concentrated along shipping routes in the Northern Hemisphere; in the latter dataset (HIRS SST), data cover the global domain. Ensembles of five 30-day mean fields are obtained from integrations performed in the perpetual-January mode. The results are presented as anomalies, that is, departures of each ensemble mean from that produced in a control simulation with climatological SSTs.

Large differences are found between the anomalies obtained using COADS and HIRS SSTs, even in the Northern Hemisphere where the datasets am most similar to each other. The internal variability of the circulation in the control simulation and the simulated atmospheric response to anomalous forcings appear to be linked in that the pattern of geopotential height anomalies obtained using COADS SSTs resembles the fist empirical orthogonal function (EOF 1) in the control simulation. The corresponding pattern obtained using HIRS SSTs is substantially different and somewhat resembles EOF 2 in the sector from central North America to central Asia.

To gain insight into the reasons for these results, three additional simulations are carried out with SST anomalies confined to regions where COADS SSTs are substantially warmer than HIRS SSTS. The regions correspond to warm pools in the northwest and northeast Pacific, and the northwest Atlantic. These warm pools tend to produce positive geopotential height anomalies in the northeastern part of the corresponding oceans. Both warm pools in the Pacific produce large-scale circulation anomalies with a pattern that resembles that obtained using COADS SSTs as well as EOF 1 of the control simulation; the warm pool in the Atlantic does not. These results suggest that the differences obtained with COADS SSTs and HIRS SSTs are mostly due to the differences in the datasets over the northern Pacific.

There was a blocking episode near Greenland in late January 1979. Both simulations with warm SST anomalies over the northwest and northeast Pacific show a tendency toward increased incidence of North Atlantic blocking; the simulation with warm SST anomalies over the northwest Atlantic shows a tendency toward decreased incidence. These results suggest that features in both SST datasets that do not have a counterpart in the other dataset contribute significantly to the differences between the simulated and observed fields.

The results of this study imply that uncertainties in current SST distributions for the world oceans can be as important as the SST anomalies themselves in terms of their impact on the atmospheric circulation. Caution should be exercised, therefore, when linking anomalous circulation and SST patterns, especially in long-range prediction.

Abstract

The impact of sea surface temperature (SST) anomalies on the extratropical circulation during the El Niño winter of 1997–98 is studied through atmospheric general circulation model (AGCM) integrations. The model’s midlatitude response is found to be very robust, of the correct amplitude, and to have a fairly realistic spatial structure. The sensitivity of the results to different aspects of the anomalous distributions of SST is analyzed. It is found that the extratropical circulation in the North Pacific–North American sector is significantly different if SST anomalies over the Indian Ocean are included. Using a comparison of observed and simulated 200-hPa streamfunction anomalies, it is argued that the modeled midlatitude impact of Indian Ocean SST anomalies is largely realistic. However, while the local sensitivity of the atmosphere to small differences in SST anomalies in the tropical Pacific can be substantial, the remote sensitivity in midlatitudes is small. Consistently, there is little difference between the simulated extratropical circulation anomalies obtained using SSTs predicted by the National Centers for Environmental Prediction in October 1997 and those obtained using observed tropical Pacific SSTs. Neither is there any detectable atmospheric signal associated with SST anomalies over the North Pacific.

Analyses of the results presented here suggest that the influence of SST anomalies in the Pacific and Indian Oceans during the selected ENSO event can be interpreted as the quasi-linear superposition of Rossby wave trains emanating from the subtropics of each ocean. An inspection of intraseasonal weather regimes suggests that the influence of tropical SST anomalies can also be described as a shift in the frequency of occurrence of the model’s modes of intrinsic variability and a change in their amplitude. These findings suggest the potential utility of SST forecasts for the tropical Indian Ocean.

Abstract

The ozone evolution in the lower stratosphere of the Southern Hemisphere during the period 5–10 August 1994 is analyzed. The analysis focuses on the ozone “collar” (the band of maximum values in ozone mixing ratio around the Antarctic ozone “hole” at these altitudes) and the development of “collar filaments.” Ozone mixing ratios provided by the Microwave Limb Sounder (MLS) on board the Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite and by an ER-2 aircraft participating in the Airborne Southern Hemisphere Ozone Experiment/Measurements for Assessing the Effects of Stratospheric Aircraft campaign are compared with values at corresponding locations in high-resolution isentropic maps obtained by using the numerical scheme of “contour advection with surgery” (CAS).

The CAS reconstructed ozone maps provide a view of the way in which air masses are exported from the outskirts of the collar to form the “tongues” of higher mixing ratios observed at lower latitudes on MLS synoptic maps. There is an overall consistency between the datasets insofar as the collar location is concerned. This location seems to be primarily defined by the local properties of the flow. Nevertheless the CAS reconstructed collar tends to become weaker than that depicted by MLS data. By means of radiative calculation estimates, it is argued that diabatic descent may be responsible for maintaining the ozone concentration approximately constant in the collar while filaments isentropically disperse collarlike mixing ratios from this region toward lower latitudes.