Home  About us  Contact
 

Atlantic SST (atlantic + sst)

Distribution by Scientific Domains
Earth and Environmental Science100%

Selected Abstracts

Evaluation of the North Atlantic SST forcing on the European and Northern African winter climate

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF CLIMATOLOGY, Issue 2 2006
Belén Rodríguez-Fonseca
Abstract The 1960,1996 patterns of monthly anomalous winter precipitation in Europe and North Africa (ENA) and their connection with the North Atlantic SST are studied. A lag Singular Value Decomposition analysis has been applied to monthly SST and precipitation data to define the most influential Atlantic oceanic areas on the winter ENA rainfall. The results indicate a link between the subtropical North Atlantic SST and the winter precipitation anomalies in areas of the northern,southwestern Europe and northern Africa, since the preceding summer months. We also show that the SLP pattern connected with this subtropical oceanic area is not the NAO itself, and we explain this subtropical,extratropical connection through changes in the trade winds. The estimates of ENA winter precipitation anomalies, based on the previous summer SST, have been validated using a bootstrap analysis. Finally, we verify the reliability of this connection for the whole period from 1900 to 1996. Copyright © 2006 Royal Meteorological Society. [source]

North Atlantic forcing of climate and its uncertainty from a multi-model experiment

THE QUARTERLY JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL METEOROLOGICAL SOCIETY, Issue 601 2004
M. J. Rodwell
Abstract To understand recent climate change in the North Atlantic region and to produce better climate forecasts with uncertainty estimates it is important to determine the atmospheric ,response' to Atlantic sea-surface temperature (SST) forcing. There have been conflicting results regarding the strength, character and tropical-versus-extratropical origin of this response. For model-based studies, this may indicate differing sensitivities to Atlantic SST, but the comparison is complicated by changes in experimental design. Here, a highly controlled experiment with five atmospheric models is undertaken. The influence of realistic (if reasonably strong) and optimally chosen North Atlantic (equator to 70°N) SST anomalies is isolated. Unexpected global agreement between the models is found (e.g. the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO), Eurasian temperatures, rainfall over the Americas and Africa, and the Asian monsoon). The extratropical North Atlantic region response appears to be associated with remote Caribbean and tropical Atlantic SST anomalies, and with local forcing. Some features such as the European winter-temperature response would be stronger than atmospheric ,noise' if the prescribed SST anomalies persisted for just two years. More generally, Atlantic air,sea interaction appears to be important for climate variability on the 30-year timescale and, thus, to be important in the climate-change context. The multi-model mean response patterns are in reasonable agreement with observational estimates, although the model response magnitudes may be too weak. The similarity between their responses helps to reconcile models. Inter-model differences do still exist and these are discussed and quantified. © Crown copyright, 2004. [source]

Tropical Atlantic variability in a coupled GCM

ATMOSPHERIC SCIENCE LETTERS, Issue 1 2000
Zhengyu Liu
Tropical Atlantic Variability (TAV) is simulated in a coupled GCM. The TAV seems to be consistent with a dipole mode that involves both surface and subsurface oceanic dynamics. The poor correlation of the tropical North and South Atlantic SST is suggested to be distorted by the presence of a symmetric tropical Atlantic mode. Copyright © 2000 Royal Meteorological Society. [source]