Abstract

A climatology of the middle atmosphere is determined from 11-yr integrations of the U.K. Meteorological Office Unified Model and compared with 18 years of satellite observations and 5 years of data assimilation fields. The model has an upper boundary at 0.1 mb, and above 20 mb uses Rayleigh friction as a substitute for gravity wave drag. Many of the results are, however, found to be relatively insensitive to enhancing the damping above 0.3 mb. As with most general circulation models, the polar night jet in both hemispheres is too strong and does not have the observed equatorward slope with height. The model suffers from the common “cold pole” problem and, apart from a local warm pool centered just below 100 mb in northern high latitudes in January, and another at about 30 mb at 70°S in July, has a cold bias throughout the stratosphere. At the level where polar stratospheric clouds occur, the temperature bias is about −4 K in the Northern Hemisphere and up to +6 K in the Southern Hemisphere. For the majority of the southern winters, local minimum temperatures in the lower stratosphere agree well with observations but in some years the behavior is more like the Northern Hemisphere with values rising rapidly in late winter. This feature of the simulation is also seen in the South Pole temperatures at 10 mb with midwinter warmings occurring in two of the years. At 10 mb, midwinter warming behavior at the North Pole is quite well reproduced, as is the annual cycle in extratropical circulation. In the Tropics, there is no quasi-biennial oscillation, and the semiannual oscillation in the upper stratosphere has a poorly simulated westerly phase, while the easterly phase lacks the observed seasonal asymmetry. Simulated stationary wave amplitudes in the upper stratosphere lack a strong hemispheric asymmetry and are overpredicted in both hemispheres despite having roughly the correct amplitudes at 100 mb. Interannual variability in the winter stratosphere is underestimated, and again there is evidence that the model does not produce the proper hemispheric asymmetries.

Abstract

Longitudinally asymmetric features of gravity wave propagation in a sudden warming are examined theoretically, using observed geostrophic wind fields in the stratosphere for three days of winter 1979. It is shown that the wind patterns accompanying a sudden warming act to reduce, but not eliminate, quasi-stationary gravity wave propagation to the mesosphere. The onset of large-amplitude planetary waves leads to the formation of propagating zones and forbidden zones for gravity waves of intermediate horizontal scale (50–200 km). Lateral ray movement and horizontal refraction are secondary but observable effects for these waves.

To the extent that these waves are excited isotropically in the troposphere, it is possible to evaluate the direction and magnitude of the average wavevector reaching the mesosphere as follows. Stationary waves with wavevector orthogonal to the local mean flow are selectively absorbed in the stratosphere, implying that for these waves the average wavevector transmitted to the mesosphere is antiparallel to the average of the mean flow orientation extrema in the underlying stratosphere.

Abstract

Data retrieved from the LIMS (Limb lnfrared Monitor of the Stratosphere) experiment are used 10 calculate daily isentropic distributions of Ertel's potential vorticity, ozone, water vapor and nitric acid at the 850 K level in the Northern Hemisphere stratosphere for the period 25 October 1978 through 2 April 1979. Systematic redistributions of the quasi-conservative tracers are investigated by following the evolutions of the horizontal projection of the areas enclosed by isopleths of tracer on the isentropic surface. If the horizontal velocity is nondivergent on an isentropic surface, the areas change in response to nonconservative processes and /or irreversible mixing to unresolvable scales and so provide a diagnostic for quantifying the net cited of these two processes. The effects of the seasonal variation of the solar heating on the areas are identified from the evolutions of the hemispheric means and, for the potential vorticity, from a comparison with an annual Mile integration of a zonally symmetric, general circulation model. Superimposed on the seasonal trends are changes in areas on shorter time scales, and the LIMS potential vorticity, ozone and water vapor distributions each show the distinctive “surf-zone, main–,vortex structure” described by McIntyre and Palmer. As winter progresses the main vortex decreases in size while the surf zone expands. The evidence of the observations, combined with estimates of the strength of the radiative processes acting on the potential vorticity field, indicates fairly convincingly that irreversible mixing is an important mechanism involved in the formation of the surf-zone, main-vortex structure, and the subsequent erosion in size of the vortex. In addition, there is evidence of strong diabatic cross-isentropic transport of air parcels in the surf zone acting to restore the large-scale gradients destroyed by the mixing. The only LIMS measured constituent for which mixing was not always the dominant mechanism of redistribution was nitric acid, and it is speculated that the effects of dynamically induced changes to the effective sources and sinks of nitric acid on the 850 K surface are overshadowing other processes, at least in late January and February. Implications to tracer transport studies are examined by using the isentropic potential vorticity field as a basis for calculating low resolution approximations to the Lagrangian-mean tracer mixing ratios. The results demonstrate the feasibility of the approach to the longer-species but indicate a need for further research to distinguish between dynamical and radiactive/photochemical effects.

Abstract

This paper investigates the vertical filtering of parameterized gravity wave pseudomomentum flux in the troposphere–stratosphere version of the Met Office Unified Model. Gravity wave forcing is parameterized using the Warner and McIntyre spectral gravity wave parameterization. The same amount of isotropic pseudomomentum flux per unit mass is launched from the planetary boundary layer at each grid point. The parameterization models the azimuthally dependent Doppler shifting and breaking of the gravity wave spectrum as it is filtered by the background atmosphere. The result is an anisotropic distribution of pseudomomentum flux among azimuthal sectors that varies greatly with altitude and location. This gives an idealized global climatology of nonorographic gravity waves. The filtering effect of the atmosphere in this climatology is diagnosed using the “zonal anisotropy.”

Results show areas where observational measurements could be targeted to find the most prominent features in the gravity wave field. Such areas include, for example, the summer stratosphere where zonal anisotropy is very large and where there is a significant localization in latitude and longitude of patches of high zonal anisotropy. Comparisons are also made with recent observational estimates of gravity wave fluxes and test whether wind filtering of a homogeneous, azimuthally isotropic source is enough to reproduce observed features of the gravity wave field.

Abstract

Transformed Eulerian mean (TEM) equations and Eliassen–Palm (EP) flux diagnostics are presented for the general nonhydrostatic, fully compressible, deep atmosphere formulation of the primitive equations in spherical geometric coordinates. The TEM equations are applied to a general circulation model (GCM) based on these general primitive equations. It is demonstrated that a naive application in this model of the widely used approximations to the EP diagnostics, valid for the hydrostatic primitive equations using log-pressure as a vertical coordinate and presented, for example, by Andrews et al. in 1987 can lead to misleading features in these diagnostics. These features can be of the same order of magnitude as the diagnostics themselves throughout the winter stratosphere. Similar conclusions are found to hold for “downward control” calculations. The reasons are traced to the change of vertical coordinate from geometric height to log-pressure. Implications for the modeling community, including comparison of model output with that from reanalysis products available only on pressure surfaces, are discussed.

Abstract

An examination is made of stratospheric climate, circulation, and variability in configurations of the Hadley Centre Global Environmental Model version 2 (HadGEM2) differing only in stratospheric resolution and the placement of the model lid. This is made in the context of historical reconstructions of twentieth-century climate. A reduction in the westerly bias in the Northern Hemisphere polar night jet is found in the high-top model. The authors also find significant differences in the expression of tropical stratospheric variability, finding improvements in the high-top model for the presence of the quasi-biennial oscillation, for tropical upwelling consistent with interim European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) Re-Analysis (ERA-Interim) data, and for interannual changes in stratospheric water vapor concentration comparable to satellite observations. Further differences are seen at high latitudes during winter in the frequency of occurrence of sudden stratospheric warmings (SSWs). The occurrence rate of SSWs in the high-top simulations, (7.2 ± 0.5) decade⁻¹, is statistically consistent with observations, (6.0 ± 1.0) decade⁻¹, whereas they are one-third as frequent in the low-top simulations, (2.5 ± 0.5) decade⁻¹. Furthermore, the structure of the timing of winter final warmings is only captured in the high-top model. A similar characterization for the time evolution of the width of the tropical upper troposphere is found between model configurations. It is concluded that an adequate representation of the stratosphere is required to capture the important modes of tropical and extratropical stratospheric variability in models.

Abstract

Sudden stratospheric warmings (SSWs) are large, rapid temperature rises in the winter polar stratosphere, occurring predominantly in the Northern Hemisphere. Major SSWs are also associated with a reversal of the climatological westerly zonal-mean zonal winds. Circulation anomalies associated with SSWs can descend into the troposphere with substantial surface weather impacts, such as wintertime extreme cold air outbreaks. After their discovery in 1952, SSWs were classified by the World Meteorological Organization. An examination of literature suggests that a single, original reference for an exact definition of SSWs is elusive, but in many references a definition involves the reversal of the meridional temperature gradient and, for major warmings, the reversal of the zonal circulation poleward of 60° latitude at 10 hPa.

Though versions of this definition are still commonly used to detect SSWs, the details of the definition and its implementation remain ambiguous. In addition, other SSW definitions have been used in the last few decades, resulting in inconsistent classification of SSW events. We seek to answer the questions: How has the SSW definition changed, and how sensitive is the detection of SSWs to the definition used? For what kind of analysis is a “standard” definition useful? We argue that a standard SSW definition is necessary for maintaining a consistent and robust metric to assess polar stratospheric wintertime variability in climate models and other statistical applications. To provide a basis for, and to encourage participation in, a communitywide discussion currently underway, we explore what criteria are important for a standard definition and propose possible ways to update the definition.

Abstract

Results are presented from two 60-yr integrations of the troposphere–stratosphere configuration of the U.K. Met. Office’s Unified Model. The integrations were set up identically, apart from different initial conditions, which, nonetheless, were both representative of the early 1990s. Radiative heating rates were calculated using the IS92A projected concentrations of the well-mixed greenhouse gases (GHGs) given by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, but changes in stratospheric ozone and water vapor were not included. Sea surface conditions were taken from a separate coupled ocean–atmosphere experiment. Both integrations reproduced the familiar pattern of tropospheric warming and a stratospheric cooling increasing with height to about −1.4 K per decade at 1 mb. There was good agreement in the trends apart from in the polar upper stratosphere and, to a greater extent, the polar lower-to-middle stratosphere, where there is significant interannual variability during the winter months. Even after decadal smoothing, the trends in the northern winter were still overshadowed by the variability resulting from the planetary wave forcing from the troposphere. In general, the decadal variability of the Northern Hemisphere stratosphere was not a manifestation of a uniform change throughout each winter but, as with other models, there was a change in the frequency of occurrence of sudden stratospheric warmings. Unlike previous studies, the different results from the two simulations confirm the change in frequency of warmings was due to internal atmospheric variability and not the prescribed changes in GHG concentrations or sea surface conditions. In the southern winter stratosphere the flux of wave activity from the troposphere increased, but any additional dynamical heating was more than offset by the extra radiative cooling from the growing total GHG concentration. Consequently the polar vortex became more stable, with the spring breakdown delayed by 1–2 weeks by the 2050s. Polar stratospheric cloud (PSC) amounts inferred from the predicted temperatures increased in both hemispheres, especially in the early winter. In the Southern Hemisphere, the region of PSC formation expanded both upward and equatorward in response to the temperature trend.

Abstract

With extreme variability of the Arctic polar vortex being a key link for stratosphere–troposphere influences, its evolution into the twenty-first century is important for projections of changing surface climate in response to greenhouse gases. Variability of the stratospheric vortex is examined using a state-of-the-art climate model and a suite of specifically developed vortex diagnostics. The model has a fully coupled ocean and a fully resolved stratosphere. Analysis of the standard stratospheric zonal mean wind diagnostic shows no significant increase over the twenty-first century in the number of major sudden stratospheric warmings (SSWs) from its historical value of 0.7 events per decade, although the monthly distribution of SSWs does vary, with events becoming more evenly dispersed throughout the winter. However, further analyses using geometric-based vortex diagnostics show that the vortex mean state becomes weaker, and the vortex centroid is climatologically more equatorward by up to 2.5°, especially during early winter. The results using these diagnostics not only characterize the vortex structure and evolution but also emphasize the need for vortex-centric diagnostics over zonally averaged measures. Finally, vortex variability is subdivided into wave-1 (displaced) and -2 (split) components, and it is implied that vortex displacement events increase in frequency under climate change, whereas little change is observed in splitting events.

Abstract

Stratospheric variability is examined in a vertically extended version of the Met Office global climate model. Equatorial variability includes the simulation of an internally generated quasi-biennial oscillation (QBO) and semiannual oscillation (SAO). Polar variability includes an examination of the frequency of sudden stratospheric warmings (SSW) and annular mode variability. Results from two different horizontal resolutions are also compared. Changes in gravity wave filtering at the higher resolution result in a slightly longer QBO that extends deeper into the lower stratosphere. At the higher resolution there is also a reduction in the occurrence rate of sudden stratospheric warmings, in better agreement with observations. This is linked with reduced levels of resolved waves entering the high-latitude stratosphere. Covariability of the tropical and extratropical stratosphere is seen, linking the phase of the QBO with disturbed NH winters, although this linkage is sporadic, in agreement with observations. Finally, tropospheric persistence time scales and seasonal variability for the northern and southern annular modes are significantly improved at the higher resolution, consistent with findings from other studies.