scholarly journals Cluster Analysis of North Atlantic–European Circulation Types and Links with Tropical Pacific Sea Surface Temperatures

2008 ◽  
Vol 21 (15) ◽  
pp. 3687-3703 ◽  
Author(s):  
D. R. Fereday ◽  
J. R. Knight ◽  
A. A. Scaife ◽  
C. K. Folland ◽  
A. Philipp
Keyword(s):  
Cluster Analysis ◽  
North Atlantic ◽  
El Niño ◽  
Clustering Algorithm ◽  
El Nino ◽  
Tropical Pacific ◽  
Sea Surface ◽  
Optimum Number ◽  
Apparent Lack ◽  
Circulation Types

Abstract Observed atmospheric circulation over the North Atlantic–European (NAE) region is examined using cluster analysis. A clustering algorithm incorporating a “simulated annealing” methodology is employed to improve on solutions found by the conventional k-means technique. Clustering is applied to daily mean sea level pressure (MSLP) fields to derive a set of circulation types for six 2-month seasons. A measure of the quality of this clustering is defined to reflect the average similarity of the fields in a cluster to each other. It is shown that a range of classifications can be produced for which this measure is almost identical but which partition the days quite differently. This lack of a unique set of circulation types suggests that distinct weather regimes in NAE circulation do not exist or are very weak. It is also shown that the stability of the clustering solution to removal of data is not maximized by a suitable choice of the number of clusters. Indeed, there does not appear to be any robust way of choosing an optimum number of circulation types. Despite the apparent lack of preferred circulation types, cluster analysis can usefully be applied to generate a set of patterns that fully characterize the different circulation types appearing in each season. These patterns can then be used to analyze NAE climate variability. Ten clusters per season are chosen to ensure that a range of distinct circulation types that span the variability is produced. Using this classification, the effect of forcing of NAE circulation by tropical Pacific sea surface temperature (SST) anomalies is analyzed. This shows a significant influence of SST in this region on certain circulation types in almost all seasons. A tendency for a negative correlation between El Niño and an anomaly pattern resembling the positive winter North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) emerges in a number of seasons. A notable exception is November–December, which shows the opposite relationship, with positive NAO-like patterns correlated with El Niño.

scholarly journals A New Picture of the Global Impacts of El Nino-Southern Oscillation

2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jialin Lin ◽  
Taotao Qian
Keyword(s):  
Surface Temperature ◽  
Sea Surface Temperature ◽  
El Niño ◽  
El Nino ◽  
Southern Oscillation ◽  
Tropical Pacific ◽  
Sea Surface ◽  
El Niño Southern Oscillation ◽  
El Nino Southern Oscillation ◽  
Global Impacts

AbstractThe El Nino-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) is the dominant interannual variability of Earth’s climate system and plays a central role in global climate prediction. Outlooks of ENSO and its impacts often follow a two-tier approach: predicting ENSO sea surface temperature anomaly in tropical Pacific and then predicting its global impacts. However, the current picture of ENSO global impacts widely used by forecasting centers and atmospheric science textbooks came from two earliest surface station datasets complied 30 years ago, and focused on the extreme phases rather than the whole ENSO lifecycle. Here, we demonstrate a new picture of the global impacts of ENSO throughout its whole lifecycle based on the rich latest satellite, in situ and reanalysis datasets. ENSO impacts are much wider than previously thought. There are significant impacts unknown in the previous picture over Europe, Africa, Asia and North America. The so-called “neutral years” are not neutral, but are associated with strong sea surface temperature anomalies in global oceans outside the tropical Pacific, and significant anomalies of land surface air temperature and precipitation over all the continents.

Climate variability of the Great Barrier Reef in relation to the tropical Pacific and El Niño-Southern Oscillation

2012 ◽  
Vol 63 (1) ◽  
pp. 34 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ana Redondo-Rodriguez ◽  
Scarla J. Weeks ◽  
Ray Berkelmans ◽  
Ove Hoegh-Guldberg ◽  
Janice M. Lough
Keyword(s):  
Climate Variability ◽  
Great Barrier Reef ◽  
El Niño ◽  
El Nino ◽  
Southern Oscillation ◽  
Tropical Pacific ◽  
Sea Surface ◽  
El Nino Southern Oscillation ◽  
Barrier Reef ◽  
Enso Events

Understanding the nature and causes of recent climate variability on the Great Barrier Reef (GBR), Australia, is fundamental to assessing the impacts of future climate change on this complex ecosystem. New analytical tools, improved data quality and resolution, longer time-series and new variables provide an opportunity to re-assess existing paradigms. Here, we examined sea surface temperature (SST), sea level pressure, surface winds, sea surface height and ocean currents for the period from 1948 to 2009. We focussed on the relationship between GBR surface climate and the wider tropical Pacific, and the influence of El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) events. Also, for the first time, we investigated the impact of the El Niño/La Niña Modoki phenomenon. Although neither type of ENSO event is a primary driver of inter-annual climate variability on the GBR, their influence is conspicuous. Classical ENSO events have a strong signature in the atmospheric circulation in the northern GBR but no significant relationship with SSTs and the opposite applies for the southern GBR. Conversely, El Niño/La Niña Modoki is significantly related to summer SSTs on the northern GBR, but not for the southern GBR. This study enhances our understanding of tropical Pacific and GBR climate drivers and will improve future predictions of change in climate variables that are likely to impact on the complex GBR ecosystem.

scholarly journals A Simple Analytical Model for Understanding the Formation of Sea Surface Temperature Patterns under Global Warming*

2014 ◽  
Vol 27 (22) ◽  
pp. 8413-8421 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lei Zhang ◽  
Tim Li
Keyword(s):  
Global Warming ◽  
Indian Ocean ◽  
Surface Temperature ◽  
Sea Surface Temperature ◽  
El Niño ◽  
El Nino ◽  
Tropical Pacific ◽  
Sea Surface ◽  
The Tropics ◽  
The Tropical Pacific

Abstract How sea surface temperature (SST) changes under global warming is critical for future climate projection because SST change affects atmospheric circulation and rainfall. Robust features derived from 17 models of phase 5 of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (CMIP5) include a much greater warming in high latitudes than in the tropics, an El Niño–like warming over the tropical Pacific and Atlantic, and a dipole pattern in the Indian Ocean. However, the physical mechanism responsible for formation of such warming patterns remains open. A simple theoretical model is constructed to reveal the cause of the future warming patterns. The result shows that a much greater polar, rather than tropical, warming depends primarily on present-day mean SST and surface latent heat flux fields, and atmospheric longwave radiation feedback associated with cloud change further enhances this warming contrast. In the tropics, an El Niño–like warming over the Pacific and Atlantic arises from a similar process, while cloud feedback resulting from different cloud regimes between east and west ocean basins also plays a role. A dipole warming over the equatorial Indian Ocean is a response to weakened Walker circulation in the tropical Pacific.

Resolving Contrasting Regional Rainfall Responses to El Niño over Tropical Africa

2016 ◽  
Vol 29 (4) ◽  
pp. 1461-1476 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pradipta Parhi ◽  
Alessandra Giannini ◽  
Pierre Gentine ◽  
Upmanu Lall
Keyword(s):  
Water Vapor ◽  
Indian Ocean ◽  
North Atlantic ◽  
El Niño ◽  
Rainy Season ◽  
El Nino ◽  
Sea Surface ◽  
Eastern Africa ◽  
Surface Warming ◽  
Western Sahel

Abstract The evolution of El Niño can be separated into two phases—namely, growth and mature—depending on whether the regional sea surface temperature has adjusted to the tropospheric warming in the remote tropics (tropical regions away from the central and eastern tropical Pacific Ocean). The western Sahel’s main rainy season (July–September) is shown to be affected by the growth phase of El Niño through (i) a lack of neighboring North Atlantic sea surface warming, (ii) an absence of an atmospheric column water vapor anomaly over the North Atlantic and western Sahel, and (iii) higher atmospheric vertical stability over the western Sahel, resulting in the suppression of mean seasonal rainfall as well as number of wet days. In contrast, the short rainy season (October–December) of tropical eastern Africa is impacted by the mature phase of El Niño through (i) neighboring Indian Ocean sea surface warming, (ii) positive column water vapor anomalies over the Indian Ocean and tropical eastern Africa, and (iii) higher atmospheric vertical instability over tropical eastern Africa, leading to an increase in the mean seasonal rainfall as well as in the number of wet days. While the modulation of the frequency of wet days and seasonal mean accumulation is statistically significant, daily rainfall intensity (for days with rainfall > 1 mm day−1), whether mean, median, or extreme, does not show a significant response in either region. Hence, the variability in seasonal mean rainfall that can be attributed to the El Niño–Southern Oscillation phenomenon in both regions is likely due to changes in the frequency of rainfall.

scholarly journals Reproduction of the blue-footed booby predicts commercial fish abundance in the eastern tropical Pacific

2013 ◽  
Vol 70 (6) ◽  
pp. 1263-1272
Author(s):  
Juan Meraz ◽  
Sergio Ancona ◽  
Cristina Rodríguez ◽  
Hugh Drummond
Keyword(s):  
El Niño ◽  
El Nino ◽  
Tropical Pacific ◽  
Fish Abundance ◽  
Sea Surface ◽  
Eastern Tropical Pacific ◽  
Prey Fish ◽  
Commercial Fish ◽  
Local Abundance ◽  
Two Factors

Abstract Meraz, J., Ancona, S., Rodríguez, C., and Drummond, H. 2013. Reproduction of the blue-footed booby predicts commercial fish abundance in the eastern tropical Pacific. – ICES Journal of Marine Science, 70: 1263–1272. To establish whether reproduction in a colony of the blue-footed booby in the eastern tropical Pacific predicts local abundance of prey fish several months later, 13 years of data were analysed. Eight reproductive variables assessed during the period of January–May, grouped in two factors, were related to commercial catches in the surrounding 6600 km2 area during the following June–December. The first factor explained 33% of interannual variance in fish captures per unit effort during June–December (future FCUE), and 63% when only El Niño years were considered. Also, the proportion of large clutches present on three single-day censuses in the spring explained 51, 46 and 35% of variance in future FCUE among all years, and 78, 85 and 82% of variance among El Niño years. In contrast, sea surface temperatures in March did not explain variance in future FCUE. Proportion of large clutches is a moderately good predictor of the abundance of commercial fish during the subsequent seven months and can be satisfactorily and cheaply measured on a single day.

Teleconnected influence of North Atlantic sea surface temperature on the El Niño onset

2010 ◽  
Vol 37 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 663-676 ◽  
Author(s):  
Xin Wang ◽  
Chunzai Wang ◽  
Wen Zhou ◽  
Dongxiao Wang ◽  
Jie Song
Keyword(s):  
Surface Temperature ◽  
Sea Surface Temperature ◽  
North Atlantic ◽  
El Niño ◽  
El Nino ◽  
Sea Surface

scholarly journals Oceanic Rossby Waves over Eastern Tropical Pacific of Both Hemispheres Forced by Anomalous Surface Winds after Mature Phase of ENSO

2016 ◽  
Vol 46 (11) ◽  
pp. 3397-3414 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hiroto Abe ◽  
Youichi Tanimoto ◽  
Takuya Hasegawa ◽  
Naoto Ebuchi
Keyword(s):  
Rossby Wave ◽  
El Niño ◽  
Rossby Waves ◽  
El Nino ◽  
Tropical Pacific ◽  
Sea Surface ◽  
Eastern Coast ◽  
Eastern Tropical Pacific ◽  
Enso Events ◽  
Anomalous Surface

AbstractThe present study examined ENSO-related wind forcing contribution to off-equatorial Rossby wave formations in the eastern tropical regions of the North and South Pacific using satellite altimeter data and atmospheric reanalysis data during the period of 1993–2013. After mature phases of ENSO events, the sea surface height anomaly fields showed that off-equatorial Rossby waves propagated westward along 11°N and 8°S from the eastern Pacific. Starting longitudes of the westward propagation were distant from the eastern coast, especially for weak El Niño events in the 2000s, in contrast to the strong 1997/98 El Niño event in which the propagations started from the coast. Based on observational data, it was hypothesized that the Rossby waves could be formed by off-equatorial zonal belts of wind stress curl anomalies (WSCAs) in 135°–90°W rather than by wave emissions from the eastern coast. A numerical model forced only by WSCAs, that is, without wave emissions from the coast, successfully reproduced observed features of the Rossby waves in 180°–120°W, supporting the study’s hypothesis. During mature phases of El Niño events, equatorially symmetric negative sea level pressure anomalies (SLPAs) resulting from hydrostatic adjustment to the underlying warm sea surface temperature anomalies dominated over the eastern tropical Pacific. Anomalous surface easterlies blowing around the negative SLPA area as geostrophic winds were a major contributor in forming the anticyclonic WSCAs. The polarity of the anomalies is reversed during La Niña events. Therefore, spatial patterns of the SLPAs associated with the ENSO events are necessary to understand the Rossby wave formations.

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