ALBERT

Description: An ocean circulation model is run using two different idealized equatorial basin configurations under steady wind forcing. Both model versions produce bands of vertically alternating zonal flow at depth, similar to observed Equatorial Deep Jets (EDJs) and with a time scale corresponding to that of the gravest equatorial basin mode for the dominant baroclinic vertical normal mode. Both model runs show evidence for enhanced variability in the surface signature of the North Equatorial Counter Current (NECC) with the same time scale. We also find the same link between the observed NECC and the EDJs in the Atlantic by comparing the signature of the EDJ in moored zonal velocity data at 23° W on the equator with the signature of the NECC in geostrophic velocities from altimeter data. We argue that the presence of a peak in variability in the NECC associated with the EDJ basin mode period is evidence that the influenceatthis time scale is upward, from the EDJ to the NECC

Description: The Atlantic meridional overturning circulation (AMOC) and the subpolar gyre (SPG) are important elements in mechanisms for multidecadal variability in models in the North Atlantic Ocean. In this study, a 2000-year long global ocean model integration forced with the atmospheric patterns associated with a white noise North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) index is shown to have three distinct timescales of North Atlantic Ocean variability. First, an interannual timescale with variability shorter than 15 years, that can be related to Ekman dynamics. Second, a multidecadal timescale, on the 15- to 65-year range, that is mainly concentrated in the SPG region and is controlled by constructive interference between density anomalies around the gyre and the changing NAO forcing. Finally, the centennial timescales, with variability longer than 65 years, that can be attributed to the ocean being in a series of quasi-equilibrium states. The relationship between the ocean’s response and the NAO index differs for each timescale; the 15-year and shorter timescales are directly related to the NAO of the same year, 15- to 65-year timescales are dependent on the NAO index in the last 25–30 years in a sinusoidal sense while the 65-year and longer timescales relate to a sum of the last 50–80 years of the NAO index.

Description: The variability of the East Asian summer monsoon (EASM) is studied using a pacemaker technique driven by ENSO in an atmospheric general circulation model (AGCM) coupled to a slab mixed layer model. In the pacemaker experiments, sea surface temperature (SST) is constrained to observations in the eastern equatorial Pacific through a q-flux that measures the contribution of ocean dynamics to SST variability, while the AGCM is coupled to the slab model. An ensemble of pacemaker experiments is analyzed using a multivariate EOF analysis to identify the two major modes of variability of the EASM. The results show that the pacemaker experiments simulate a substantial amount (around 45 %) of the variability of the first mode (the Pacific-Japan pattern) in ERA40 from 1979 to 1999. Different from previous work, the pacemaker experiments also simulate a large part (25 %) of the variability of the second mode, related to rainfall variability over northern China. Furthermore, we find that the lower (850 hPa) and the upper (200 hPa) tropospheric circulation of the first mode display the same degree of reproducibility whereas only the lower part of the second mode is reproducible. The basis for the success of the pacemaker experiments is the ability of the experiments to reproduce the observed relationship between El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and the EASM.

Description: Near-inertial oscillations are ubiquitous in the ocean and are believed to play an important role in the global climate system. Studies on wind power input to near-inertial motions (WPI) have so far focused primarily on estimating the time-mean WPI, with little attention being paid to its temporal variability. In this study, a combination of atmospheric reanalysis products, a high-resolution ocean model and linear regression models are used to investigate for the first time the relationship between interannual variability of WPI in the North Atlantic and the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO), motivated by the idea that the NAO serves as a good indicator for storminess over the North Atlantic and that storms account for the majority of WPI. It is found that WPI at low and high latitudes of the North Atlantic is significantly correlated to the NAO, owing to its influence on the configuration of the storm track. Positive (negative) NAO conditions are associated with increased WPI in the subpolar (subtropical) ocean. Basin-wide WPI is found to be significantly enhanced under negative NAO conditions, but is not significantly different from the climatological average under positive NAO conditions. This indicates a weak inverse relationship between basin-wide WPI and the NAO, contradicting intuitive expectations. The asymmetric impact of the NAO on basin-wide WPI results from greater sensitivity of WPI to near-inertial wind forcing at lower latitudes due to the variation of the Coriolis parameter with latitude.

Description: Tropical influence on the austral summer Southern Annular Mode (SAM) over the ERA-40 period 1960/1961–2001/2002 is investigated using (1) a partially coupled climate model (PCM) driven by observed wind stress and (2) a version of the ECMWF atmospheric model by means of a relaxation technique. We show that the tropical influence in the PCM is dominated by El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) whereas the relaxation experiments suggest an additional influence independent of ENSO. In the observations, we find that the simultaneous influence of ENSO on the summer SAM was much stronger after 1979 than before, with the consequence that the ensemble mean of the PCM captures around 50 % of the interannual variance of the SAM after 1979 and less than 10 % before. Nevertheless, in the ensemble mean of the PCM, the relationship between ENSO and the summer SAM is stable throughout the whole period 1960/1961–2001/2002, and it is the individual ensemble members that exhibit a non-stationary relationship like that found in the observations. It follows that variability not related to the observed wind forcing used to drive the PCM is important for obscuring the ENSO/SAM relationship. The experiments using relaxation show that tropical forcing was important for both the interannual variability and the trend of the summer SAM, even before 1979. Adding the observed extratropical sea surface temperature and sea-ice (SSTSI) to the tropical relaxation runs improves the model performance, indicative of a positive feedback from extratropical SSTSI onto the SAM.

Description: The spatial pattern of the first mode of interannual variability associated with the East Asian summer monsoon (EASM), obtained from a multivariate Empirical Orthogonal Functions (MV-EOF) analysis, corresponds to the Pacific–Japan (PJ) pattern and is referred to as the PJ-mode. The present study investigates the interannual variation of the PJ-mode from the perspective of the intraseasonal timescale. In particular, the impact of the Madden–Julian oscillation (MJO) on the interannual variation of the PJ-mode is investigated. The results show that the MJO has a significant influence on the interannual variation of the PJ-mode mainly in the lower troposphere (850 hPa) and that the former accounts for approximately 11% of the amplitude of the latter. The major part of the contribution comes from a change in frequency of the different phases of the MJO, especially that of MJO phase 6. This suggests that intraseasonal variation of the convection anomalies over the tropical eastern Indian and western Pacific Oceans plays an important role in the interannual variation of the PJ-mode. In addition, MJO phase 7 also contributes to the interannual variability of the PJ-mode, in this case induced by both the change in frequency and the change in circulation anomalies associated with MJO phase 7.

Description: Beside its global effects, climate change is manifested in many regionally pronounced features mainly resulting from changes in the oceanic and atmospheric circulation. Here we investigate the influence of the North Atlantic SST on shaping the winter-time response to global warming. Our results are based on a long-term climate projection with the Max Planck Institute Earth System Model (MPI-ESM) to investigate the influence of North Atlantic sea surface temperature pattern changes on shaping the atmospheric climate change signal. In sensitivity experiments with the model’s atmospheric component we decompose the response into components controlled by the local SST structure and components controlled by global/remote changes. MPI-ESM simulates a global warming response in SST similar to other climate models: there is a warming minimum—or ”warming hole”—in the subpolar North Atlantic, and the sharp SST gradients associated with the Gulf Stream and the North Atlantic Current shift northward by a few a degrees. Over the warming hole, global warming causes a relatively weak increase in rainfall. Beyond this, our experiments show more localized effects, likely resulting from future SST gradient changes in the North Atlantic. This includes a significant precipitation decrease to the south of the Gulf Stream despite increased underlying SSTs. Since this region is characterised by a strong band of precipitation in the current climate, this is contrary to the usual case that wet regions become wetter and dry regions become drier in a warmer climate. A moisture budget analysis identifies a complex interplay of various processes in the region of modified SST gradients: reduced surface winds cause a decrease in evaporation; and thermodynamic, modified atmospheric eddy transports, and coastal processes cause a change in the moisture convergence. The changes in the the North Atlantic storm track are mainly controlled by the non-regional changes in the forcing. The impact of the local SST pattern changes on regions outside the North Atlantic is small in our setup.

Description: The North Atlantic cold bias, associated with the misplacement of the North Atlantic Current (NAC) and typically extending from the surface to 1000 m depth, is a common problem in coupled models that compromises model fidelity. We investigate the use of a flow field correction (FFC) to adjust the path of the NAC and alleviate the cold bias. The FFC consists of three steps. First, climatological potential temperature (T) and salinity (S) fields for use with the model are produced using a three-dimensional restoring technique. Second, these T, S fields are used to modify the momentum equations of the ocean model. In the third stage, the correction term is diagnosed to construct a flow-independent correction. Results using the Kiel Climate Model show that the FFC allows the establishment of a northwest corner, substantially alleviating the subsurface cold bias. A cold bias remains at the surface but can be eliminated by additionally correcting the surface freshwater flux, without adjusting the surface heat flux seen by the ocean model. A model version in which only the surface fluxes of heat and freshwater are corrected continues to exhibit the incorrect path of the NAC and a strong subsurface bias. We also show that the bias in the atmospheric circulation is reduced in some corrected model versions. The FFC can be regarded as a way to correct for model error, e.g. associated with the deep water mass pathways and their impact on the large-scale ocean circulation, and unresolved processes such as eddy momentum flux convergence.