scholarly journals Internal Variability of the Winter Stratosphere. Part II: Time-Dependent Forcing

2008 ◽  
Vol 65 (7) ◽  
pp. 2375-2388 ◽  
Author(s):  
R. K. Scott ◽  
L. M. Polvani ◽  
D. W. Waugh

Abstract This paper considers the effect of time-dependent lower boundary wave forcing on the internal variability found to appear spontaneously in a stratosphere-only model when the forcing is perfectly steady. While the time-dependent forcing is found to modulate the internal variability, leading in some cases to frequency locking of the upper-stratospheric response to the forcing, the temporal and spatial structure of the variability remains similar to the case when the forcing is time independent. Experiments with a time-periodic modulation of the forcing amplitude indicate that the wave flux through the lower boundary is only partially related to the instantaneous forcing, but is more significantly influenced by the condition of the polar vortex itself. In cases of purely random wave forcing with zero time mean, the stratospheric response is similar to that obtained with steady forcing of magnitude equal to the root-mean-square of the time-varying forcing.

2006 ◽  
Vol 63 (11) ◽  
pp. 2758-2776 ◽  
Author(s):  
R. K. Scott ◽  
L. M. Polvani

Abstract This paper examines the nature and robustness of internal stratospheric variability, namely the variability resulting from the internal dynamics of the stratosphere itself, as opposed to that forced by external sources such as the natural variability of the free troposphere. Internal stratospheric variability arises from the competing actions of radiative forcing, which under perpetual winter conditions strengthens the polar vortex, and planetary wave breaking, which weakens it. The results from a stratosphere-only model demonstrate that strong internal stratospheric variability, consisting of repeated sudden warming-type events, exists over a wide range of realistic radiative and wave forcing conditions, and is largely independent of other physical and numerical parameters. In particular, the coherent form of the variability persists as the number of degrees of freedom is increased, and is therefore not an artifact of severe model truncation. Various diagnostics, including three-dimensional representations of the potential vorticity, illustrate that the variability is determined by the vertical structure of the vortex and the extent to which upward wave propagation is favored or inhibited. In this paper, the variability arising from purely internal stratosphere dynamics is isolated by specifying thermal and wave forcings that are completely time independent. In a second paper, the authors investigate the relative importance of internal and external variability by considering time-dependent wave forcing as a simple representation of tropospheric variability.


2014 ◽  
Vol 27 (8) ◽  
pp. 2931-2947 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ed Hawkins ◽  
Buwen Dong ◽  
Jon Robson ◽  
Rowan Sutton ◽  
Doug Smith

Abstract Decadal climate predictions exhibit large biases, which are often subtracted and forgotten. However, understanding the causes of bias is essential to guide efforts to improve prediction systems, and may offer additional benefits. Here the origins of biases in decadal predictions are investigated, including whether analysis of these biases might provide useful information. The focus is especially on the lead-time-dependent bias tendency. A “toy” model of a prediction system is initially developed and used to show that there are several distinct contributions to bias tendency. Contributions from sampling of internal variability and a start-time-dependent forcing bias can be estimated and removed to obtain a much improved estimate of the true bias tendency, which can provide information about errors in the underlying model and/or errors in the specification of forcings. It is argued that the true bias tendency, not the total bias tendency, should be used to adjust decadal forecasts. The methods developed are applied to decadal hindcasts of global mean temperature made using the Hadley Centre Coupled Model, version 3 (HadCM3), climate model, and it is found that this model exhibits a small positive bias tendency in the ensemble mean. When considering different model versions, it is shown that the true bias tendency is very highly correlated with both the transient climate response (TCR) and non–greenhouse gas forcing trends, and can therefore be used to obtain observationally constrained estimates of these relevant physical quantities.


2018 ◽  
Vol 115 (14) ◽  
pp. 3569-3574 ◽  
Author(s):  
Clara del Junco ◽  
Laura Tociu ◽  
Suriyanarayanan Vaikuntanathan

Minimal models of active and driven particles have recently been used to elucidate many properties of nonequilibrium systems. However, the relation between energy consumption and changes in the structure and transport properties of these nonequilibrium materials remains to be explored. We explore this relation in a minimal model of a driven liquid that settles into a time periodic steady state. Using concepts from stochastic thermodynamics and liquid state theories, we show how the work performed on the system by various nonconservative, time-dependent forces—this quantifies a violation of time reversal symmetry—modifies the structural, transport, and phase transition properties of the driven liquid.


Author(s):  
Eric A. Butcher ◽  
S. C. Sinha

Abstract In this study a possible application of time-dependent canonical perturbation theory to a fast nonlinear time-periodic Hamiltonian with strong internal excitation is considered. It is shown that if the time-periodic unperturbed part is quadratic, the Hamiltonian may be canonically transformed to an equivalent form in which the new unperturbed part is time-invariant so that the time-dependent canonical perturbation theory may be successfully applied. For this purpose, the Liapunov-Floquet (L-F) transformation and its inverse associated with the unperturbed time-periodic quadratic Hamiltonian are computed using a recently developed technique. Action-angle variables and time-dependent canonical perturbation theory are then utilized to find the solution in the original coordinates. The results are compared for accuracy with solutions obtained by both numerical integration and by the classical method of directly applying the time-dependent perturbation theory in which the time-periodic quadratic part is treated as another perturbation term. A strongly excited Mathieu-Hill quadratic Hamiltonian with a cubic perturbation and a nonlinear time-periodic Hamiltonian without a constant quadratic part serve as illustrative examples. It is shown that, unlike the classical method in which the internal excitation must be weak, the proposed formulation provides accurate solutions for an arbitrarily large internal excitation.


1984 ◽  
Vol 218 (2) ◽  
pp. 379-386 ◽  
Author(s):  
V A Zammit

The degree of inhibition of CPT I (carnitine palmitoyltransferase, EC 2.3.1.21) in isolated rat liver mitochondria by malonyl-CoA was studied by measuring the activity of the enzyme over a short period (15s) after exposure of the mitochondria to malonyl-CoA for different lengths of time. Inhibition of CPT I by malonyl-CoA was markedly time-dependent, and the increase occurred at the same rate in the presence or absence of palmitoyl-CoA (80 microM), and in the presence of carnitine, such that the time-course of acylcarnitine formation deviated markedly from linearity when CPT I activity was measured in the presence of malonyl-CoA over several minutes. The initial rate of increase in degree of inhibition with time was independent of malonyl-CoA concentration. CPT I in mitochondria from 48 h-starved rats had a lower degree of inhibition by malonyl-CoA at zero time, but was equally capable of being sensitized to malonyl-CoA, as judged by an initial rate of increase of inhibition identical with that of the enzyme in mitochondria from fed rats. Double-reciprocal plots for the degree of inhibition produced by different malonyl-CoA concentrations at zero time for the enzyme in mitochondria from fed or starved animals indicated that the enzyme in the latter mitochondria was predominantly in a state with low affinity for malonyl-CoA (concentration required to give 50% inhibition, I0.5 congruent to 10 microM), whereas that in mitochondria from fed rats displayed two distinct sets of affinities: low (congruent to 10 microM) and high (less than 0.3 microM). Plots for mitochondria after incubation for 0.5 or 1 min with malonyl-CoA indicated that the increased sensitivity observed with time was due to a gradual increase in the high-affinity state in both types of mitochondria. These results suggest that the sensitivity of CPT I in rat liver mitochondria in vitro had two components: (i) an instantaneous sensitivity inherent to the enzyme which depends on the nutritional state of the animal from which the mitochondria are isolated, and (ii) a slow, malonyl-CoA-induced, time-dependent increase in sensitivity. It is suggested that the rate of malonyl-CoA-induced sensitization of the enzyme to malonyl-CoA inhibition is limited by a slow first-order process, which occurs after the primary event of interaction of malonyl-CoA with the mitochondria.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 400 WORDS)


2007 ◽  
Vol 20 (16) ◽  
pp. 4243-4254 ◽  
Author(s):  
William J. Gutowski ◽  
Helin Wei ◽  
Charles J. Vörösmarty ◽  
Balázs M. Fekete

Abstract The Arctic’s land surface has large areas of wetlands that exchange moisture, energy, and momentum with the atmosphere. The authors use a mesoscale, pan-Arctic model simulating the summer of 1986 to examine links between the wetlands and arctic atmospheric dynamics and water cycling. Simulations with and without wetlands are compared to simulations using perturbed initial and lateral boundary conditions to delineate when and where the wetlands influence rises above nonlinear internal variability. The perturbation runs expose the temporal variability of the circulation’s sensitivity to changes in lower boundary conditions. For the wetlands cases examined here, the period of the most significant influence is approximately two weeks, and the wetlands do not introduce new circulation changes but rather appear to reinforce and modify existing circulation responses to perturbations. The largest circulation sensitivity, and thus the largest wetlands influence, occurs in central Siberia. The circulation changes induced by adding the wetlands appear as a propagating, equivalent barotropic wave. The wetlands anomaly circulation spreads alterations of surface fluxes to other locations, which undermines the potential for the wetlands to present a distinctive, spatially fixed forcing to atmospheric circulation. Using the climatology of artic synoptic-storm occurrence to indicate when the arctic circulation is most sensitive to altered forcing, the results suggest that the circulation is susceptible to the direct influence of wetlands for a limited time period extending from spring thaw of wetlands until synoptic-storm occurrence diminishes in midsummer. Sensitivities in arctic circulation uncovered through this work occur during a period of substantial transition from a fundamentally frozen to thawed state, a period of major concern for impacts of greenhouse warming on pan-Arctic climate. Changing arctic climate could alter the behavior revealed here.


2006 ◽  
Vol 63 (3) ◽  
pp. 936-951 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Hampson ◽  
Peter Haynes

Abstract The work described here examines the influence of the equatorial quasi-biennial oscillation (QBO) on the extratropics in a zonally truncated 3D mechanistic stratospheric model. Model results show that the extratropical response to the QBO depends critically on the phase alignment of the QBO with the annual cycle: the signal of extratropical response varies by a factor of 8 between the phase alignment that gives minimum response and that which gives maximum response. Model simulations in which the time and height structure of the QBO are varied suggest that, in this zonally truncated model, the equatorial height of 21–23 km is most influential for the extratropical response and that late autumn/early winter is the time at which the QBO has the most influence over the extratropical circulation. The correlation coefficient between the QBO (measured by zonal wind) and the extratropics (measured by zonal wind or potential temperature) is as high as 0.95. The correlation coefficient is largest for simulations with lower boundary wave forcing weaker than that which gives largest extratropical interannual variability. For stronger extratropical wave forcing, the correlation coefficient is slightly smaller, but the regression coefficient of the linear term in a least squares fit is significantly larger.


2017 ◽  
Vol 17 (3) ◽  
pp. 2437-2458 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sandro W. Lubis ◽  
Vered Silverman ◽  
Katja Matthes ◽  
Nili Harnik ◽  
Nour-Eddine Omrani ◽  
...  

Abstract. It is well established that variable wintertime planetary wave forcing in the stratosphere controls the variability of Arctic stratospheric ozone through changes in the strength of the polar vortex and the residual circulation. While previous studies focused on the variations in upward wave flux entering the lower stratosphere, here the impact of downward planetary wave reflection on ozone is investigated for the first time. Utilizing the MERRA2 reanalysis and a fully coupled chemistry–climate simulation with the Community Earth System Model (CESM1(WACCM)) of the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR), we find two downward wave reflection effects on ozone: (1) the direct effect in which the residual circulation is weakened during winter, reducing the typical increase of ozone due to upward planetary wave events and (2) the indirect effect in which the modification of polar temperature during winter affects the amount of ozone destruction in spring. Winter seasons dominated by downward wave reflection events (i.e., reflective winters) are characterized by lower Arctic ozone concentration, while seasons dominated by increased upward wave events (i.e., absorptive winters) are characterized by relatively higher ozone concentration. This behavior is consistent with the cumulative effects of downward and upward planetary wave events on polar stratospheric ozone via the residual circulation and the polar temperature in winter. The results establish a new perspective on dynamical processes controlling stratospheric ozone variability in the Arctic by highlighting the key role of wave reflection.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document