scholarly journals Nonlinear response of tropical lower stratospheric temperature and water vapor to ENSO

Author(s):  
Chaim I. Garfinkel ◽  
Amit Gordon ◽  
Luke D. Oman ◽  
Feng Li ◽  
Sean Davis ◽  
...  

Abstract. A series of simulations using the NASA Goddard Earth Observing System Chemistry-Climate Model are analyzed in order to assess interannual and sub-decadal variability in tropical lower stratospheric temperature and water vapor over the past 35 years. The impact of El Niño-Southern Oscillation in this region is nonlinear. While moderate El Niño events lead to cooling in this region, strong El Niño events appear to lead to warming, even as the response of the large scale Brewer Dobson Circulation appears to scale nearly linearly with El Niño. The tropospheric warming associated with strong El Niño events extends into the tropical tropopause layer and up to the cold point, where it allows for more water vapor to enter the stratosphere. The net effect is that both strong La Niña and strong El Niño events lead to enhanced entry water vapor and stratospheric moistening. These results lead to the following interpretation of the millennial drop in water vapor in 2001: the very strong El Niño event in 1997/1998 followed by more than two consecutive years of La Niña led to enhanced lower stratospheric water vapor. As this period ended in early 2001, entry water vapor concentrations declined. The net effect is that sea surface temperature variability led to a decrease in water vapor of 0.14 ppmv after 2001, which accounts for approximately 23&thinsp.% of the observed drop.

2018 ◽  
Vol 18 (7) ◽  
pp. 4597-4615 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chaim I. Garfinkel ◽  
Amit Gordon ◽  
Luke D. Oman ◽  
Feng Li ◽  
Sean Davis ◽  
...  

Abstract. A series of simulations using the NASA Goddard Earth Observing System Chemistry–Climate Model are analyzed in order to aid in the interpretation of observed interannual and sub-decadal variability in the tropical lower stratosphere over the past 35 years. The impact of El Niño–Southern Oscillation on temperature and water vapor in this region is nonlinear in boreal spring. While moderate El Niño events lead to cooling in this region, strong El Niño events lead to warming, even as the response of the large-scale Brewer–Dobson circulation appears to scale nearly linearly with El Niño. This nonlinearity is shown to arise from the response in the Indo-West Pacific to El Niño: strong El Niño events lead to tropospheric warming extending into the tropical tropopause layer and up to the cold point in this region, where it allows for more water vapor to enter the stratosphere. The net effect is that both strong La Niña and strong El Niño events lead to enhanced entry water vapor and stratospheric moistening in boreal spring and early summer. These results lead to the following interpretation of the contribution of sea surface temperatures to the decline in water vapor in the early 2000s: the very strong El Niño event in 1997/1998, followed by more than 2 consecutive years of La Niña, led to enhanced lower-stratospheric water vapor. As this period ended in early 2001, entry water vapor concentrations declined. This effect accounts for approximately one-quarter of the observed drop.


2018 ◽  
Vol 31 (5) ◽  
pp. 1811-1832 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rong-Hua Zhang ◽  
Feng Tian ◽  
Xiujun Wang

Ocean biology components affect the vertical redistribution of incoming solar radiation in the upper ocean of the tropical Pacific and can significantly modulate El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO). The biophysical interactions in the region were represented by coupling an ocean biology model with an ocean general circulation model (OGCM); the coupled ocean physics–biology model is then forced by prescribed wind anomalies during 1980–2007. Two ocean-only experiments were performed with different representations of chlorophyll (Chl). In an interannual Chl run (referred to as Chlinter), Chl was interannually varying, which was interactively calculated from the ocean biology model to explicitly represent its heating feedback on ocean thermodynamics. The structure and relationship of the related heating terms were examined to understand the Chl-induced feedback effects and the processes involved. The portion of solar radiation penetrating the bottom of the mixed layer ( Qpen) was significantly affected by interannual Chl anomalies in the western-central equatorial Pacific. In a climatological run (Chlclim), the Chl concentration was prescribed to be its seasonally varying climatology derived from the Chlinter run. Compared with the Chlclim run, interannual variability in the Chlinter run tended to be reduced. The sea surface temperature (SST) differences between the two runs exhibited an asymmetric bioeffect: they were stronger during La Niña events but relatively weaker during El Niño events. The signs of the SST differences between the two runs indicated a close relationship with Chl: a cooling effect was associated with a low Chl concentration during El Niño events, and a strong warming effect was associated with a high Chl concentration during La Niña events.


2011 ◽  
Vol 7 (3) ◽  
pp. 2061-2088 ◽  
Author(s):  
D. Zhang ◽  
R. Blender ◽  
K. Fraedrich

Abstract. The co-operative effects of volcanic eruptions and ENSO (El Niño/Southern Oscillation) on the climate in China are analyzed in a millennium simulation for 800–2005 AD using the earth system model (ESM) ECHAM5/MPIOM/JSBACH subject to anthropogenic and natural forcings. The experiment includes two ensembles with weak (5 members) and strong (3 members) total solar irradiance variability. In the absence of El Niño and La Niña events, volcanoes, which are the dominant forcing in both ensembles, cause a dramatic cooling in West China (−2 °C) and a drought in East China during the year after the eruption. The recovery times for the volcano induced cooling vary globally between one and 12 yr; in China these values are mostly within 1–4 yr, but reach 10 yr in the Northeast. Without volcanoes, after El Niño events the summer precipitation is reduced in the North, while South China becomes wetter (indicated by the Standardized Precipitation Index, SPI, for summers, JJA); La Niña events cause opposite effects. El Niño events in the winters after eruptions compensate the cooling in most regions of China, while La Niña events intensify the cooling (up to −2.5 °C). The simulated impact of the eruption of the Tambora in 1815, which caused the "year without summer" 1816 in Europe and North America and coldness and famines for several years in the Chinese province Yunnan, depends crucially on the ENSO state of the coupled model. A comparison with reconstructed El Niño events shows a moderate cool climate with wet (in the South) and extreme dry anomalies (in the North) persisting for several years.


2014 ◽  
Vol 27 (19) ◽  
pp. 7335-7355 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pedro N. DiNezio ◽  
Clara Deser

Abstract A large fraction (35%–50%) of observed La Niña events last two years or longer, in contrast to the great majority of El Niño events, which last one year. Here, the authors explore the nonlinear processes responsible for the multiyear persistence of La Niña in the Community Climate System Model, version 4 (CCSM4), a coupled climate model that simulates the asymmetric duration of La Niña and El Niño events realistically. The authors develop a nonlinear delayed-oscillator (NDO) model of the El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO) to explore the mechanisms governing the duration of La Niña. The NDO includes nonlinear and seasonally dependent feedbacks derived from the CCSM4 heat budget, which allow it to simulate key ENSO features in quantitative agreement with CCSM4. Sensitivity experiments with the NDO show that the nonlinearity in the delayed thermocline feedback is the sole process controlling the duration of La Niña events. The authors’ results show that, as La Niña events become stronger, the delayed thermocline response does not increase proportionally. This nonlinearity arises from two processes: 1) the response of winds to sea surface temperature anomalies and 2) the ability of thermocline depth anomalies to influence temperatures at the base of the mixed layer. Thus, strong La Niña events require that the thermocline remains deeper for longer than 1 yr for sea surface temperatures to return to neutral. Ocean reanalysis data show evidence for this thermocline nonlinearity, suggesting that this process could be at work in nature.


2005 ◽  
Vol 133 (10) ◽  
pp. 2940-2946 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ge Chen ◽  
Hui Lin

Abstract Previous research has shown that oceanic water vapor (OWV) is a useful quantity for studying the low-frequency variability of the atmosphere–ocean system. In this work, 10 years (1993–2002) of high-quality OWV data derived from the Ocean Topography Experiment (TOPEX) microwave radiometer are used to investigate the impact of El Niño/La Niña on the amplitude and phase of the annual cycle. These results suggest that El Niños (La Niñas) can weaken (strengthen) the seasonality of OWV by decreasing (increasing) the annual amplitude. The change of amplitude is usually slight but significant, especially for the five most dynamic seasonal belts across the major continents at midlatitudes. The El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO) impact on the annual phase of OWV is seen to be fairly systematic and geographically correlated. The most striking feature is a large-scale advancing/delay of about 10 days (as estimated through empirical modeling) for the midlatitude oceans of the Northern Hemisphere in reaching their summer maxima during the El Niño/La Niña years. In addition, an alternative scheme for estimating the mean position of the intertropical convergence zone (ITCZ) based on the annual phase map of OWV is proposed. This ITCZ climatology favors 4°N in mean latitude, and agrees with existing results in that its position meanders from 2°S to 8°N oceanwide, and stays constantly north of the equator over the Atlantic and eastern Pacific.


2022 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul C. Rivera

An alternative physical mechanism is proposed to describe the occurrence of the episodic El Nino Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and La Nina climatic phenomena. This is based on the earthquake-perturbed obliquity change (EPOCH) model previously discovered as a major cause of the global climate change problem. Massive quakes impart a very strong oceanic force that can move the moon which in turn pulls the earth’s axis and change the planetary obliquity. Analysis of the annual geomagnetic north-pole shift and global seismic data revealed this previously undiscovered force. Using a higher obliquity in the global climate model EdGCM and constant greenhouse gas forcing showed that the seismic-induced polar motion and associated enhanced obliquity could be the major mechanism governing the mysterious climate anomalies attributed to El Nino and La Nina cycles.


Author(s):  
Arini Wahyu Utami ◽  
Jamhari Jamhari ◽  
Suhatmini Hardyastuti

Paddy and maize are two important food crops in Indonesia and mainly produced in Java Island. This research aimed to know the impact of El Nino and La Nina on paddy and maize farmer’s supply in Java. Cross sectional data from four provinces in Java was combined with time series data during 1987-2006. Paddy supply was estimated using log model, while maize supply used autoregressive model; each was estimated using two types of regression function. First, it included dummy variable of El Nino and La Nina to know their influence into paddy and maize supply. Second, Southern Oscillation Index was used to analyze the supply changing when El Nino or La Nina occur. The result showed that El Nino and La Nina did not influence paddy supply, while La Nina influenced maize supply in Java. Maize supply increased when La Nina occurred.


2013 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 148-161 ◽  
Author(s):  
Iván J. Ramírez ◽  
Sue C. Grady ◽  
Michael H. Glantz

Abstract In the 1990s Peru experienced the first cholera epidemic after almost a century. The source of emergence was initially attributed to a cargo ship, but later there was evidence of an El Niño association. It was hypothesized that marine ecosystem changes associated with El Niño led to the propagation of V. cholerae along the coast of Peru, which in turn initiated the onset of the epidemic in 1991. Earlier studies supported this explanation by demonstrating a relationship between elevated temperatures and increased cholera incidence in Peru; however, other aspects of El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and their potential impacts on cholera were not investigated. Therefore, this study examines the relationship between El Niño and cholera in Peru from a holistic view of the ENSO cycle. A “climate affairs” approach is employed as a conceptual framework to incorporate ENSO’s multidimensional nature and to generate new hypotheses about the ENSO and cholera association in Peru. The findings reveal that ENSO may have been linked to the cholera epidemic through multiple pathways, including rainfall extremes, La Niña, and social vulnerability, with impacts depending on the geography of teleconnections within Peru. When the definition of an ENSO event is examined, cholera appears to have emerged either during ENSO neutral or La Niña conditions. Furthermore, the analysis herein suggests that the impact of El Niño arrived much later, possibly resulting in heightened transmission in the austral summer of 1992. In conclusion, a modified hypothesis with these new insights on cholera emergence and transmission in Peru is presented.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Diana Cristina Díaz G. ◽  
Nancy Villegas

The influence of El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) on Colombia's hydrological variables has been shown in different studies. Most of the methodologies implemented have identified linear relationships and have associated the warm (cold) phase called El Niño (La Niña) with negative (positive) rainfall and streamflow anomalies. One of the most adverse impacts founded is the reduction in water supply during the warm phase. Therefore, it is necessary to study the linkage between ENSO and precipitation variability for efficient management of water resources. Consequently, the present paper has two purposes. The first one is to explore nonlinear correlations of the ENSO-precipitation relationship, particularly for specific regions where the freshwater resources have been significantly reduced during El Niño events. The second one is to identify which indices will enable in improving the predictability of hydro-climatological variables. The research was based on the wavelet coherence analysis of monthly precipitation time series from 1981-2016 and the ENSO indices for the same period. The results show that ENSO events influence the precipitation as periods of rainfall deficit or excess. Also, precipitation is organized in bands and that the 2–8-year scales explain most of their variance. The most significant sectors are those that cover El Niño events. In contrast, sectors are smaller when La Niña episodes. Then impacts on precipitation tend to be greater for warm events. Results also allowed to identify that El Niño 3, Niño 3,4, ONI, and BEST indices can be good indicators for forecasting work in these specific places. The use of two kinds of data, one in situ and the other from CHIRPS program, allows to establish the feasibility of using data from satellite origin in regions without enough information; the results showed that CHIRPS data tend to report fewer anomalies than data in situ. However, the coherence structure is similar, but in periods between 36 and 48 months, there were discrepancies of pi/4 in the phase difference, that is, between 3 and 6 months of difference in lags calculated with each database.


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