scholarly journals A Climatology of Extreme South American Andean Cold Surges

2018 ◽  
Vol 57 (10) ◽  
pp. 2297-2315 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kevin C. Prince ◽  
Clark Evans

AbstractCold surges represent one of several phenomena by which midlatitude features can modulate the atmosphere, both dynamically and thermodynamically, deep into the tropics. This study involves the construction of a climatology of the strongest South American cold surges that follow along the Andes Mountains to quantify the extent to which these surges modulate the atmosphere from the midlatitudes to the tropics. Cold surges occurring during June–September (austral winter) from 1980 to 2017 are considered. In this study, cold-surge events are identified using standardized anomalies of 925-hPa meridional wind and 925-hPa temperature. As compared with previous cold-surge investigations, the use of standardized anomalies better enables spatial variation in cold-surge intensity and impacts to be quantified. A strong cold surge is defined as one in which the 925-hPa temperature is at least 3 standardized anomalies below 0 and the 925-hPa meridional wind is at least 3 standardized anomalies above 0 on the meso-α scale or larger. Using these criteria, 67 events are identified. The composite cold surge is characterized by highly anomalous cold, southerly flow that originates in northern Argentina and progresses northward, significantly modulating lower-tropospheric kinematic and thermodynamic fields across the entire Amazon basin over a period of 2 to as many as 8 days.

2005 ◽  
Vol 95 (4) ◽  
pp. 289-298 ◽  
Author(s):  
L.M. Winder ◽  
C.B. Phillips ◽  
C. Lenney-Williams ◽  
R.P. Cane ◽  
K. Paterson ◽  
...  

AbstractEight South American geographical populations of the parasitoidMicroctonus hyperodaeLoan were collected in South America (Argentina, Brazil, Chile and Uruguay) and released in New Zealand for biological control of the weevilListronotus bonariensis(Kuschel), a pest of pasture grasses and cereals. DNA sequencing (16S, COI, 28S, ITS1, β-tubulin), RAPD, AFLP, microsatellite, SSCP and RFLP analyses were used to seek markers for discriminating between the South American populations. All of the South American populations were more homogeneous than expected. However, variation in microsatellites and 16S gene sequences corroborated morphological, allozyme and other phenotypic evidence of trans-Andes variation between the populations. The Chilean populations were the most genetically variable, while the variation present on the eastern side of the Andes mountains was a subset of that observed in Chile.


2009 ◽  
Vol 35 (7-8) ◽  
pp. 1477-1492 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nadja Insel ◽  
Christopher J. Poulsen ◽  
Todd A. Ehlers

Envigogika ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jiří Kmínek

There has been an “afternoon school” called Imagion in Pucallpa on the Ucayali River for the last 8 years. The goal of this school in Peru is not to substitute primary education, but to nurture a relationship to the wilderness. The author (with permission from Dr. Jan Dungel from Vracov) has used approximately 300 of his excellent paintings of wild South American fauna. These unique pictures have not only an educational value, but are also poetic. They are installed within a labyrinth which has about 400 possible paths through it – their placement imitates the jungle. Children go through the maze with a guide, with their friends or alone, and learn to recognize different species. They also put on theater performances in the school from the Amazon’s very rich mythology. Overall, this “teaching” is directed, inter alia, against prejudice, gossipy spiritualism and shamanism. In 2016, the project will move to one charming town under the eastern foothills of the Andes mountains in the jungle. In Satipo it will offer decent accommodation at cost price to about 20 European teachers for any length of time. And then an international Imagion campus for environmental and other types of schools will be patiently built there over a number of years.


2021 ◽  
Vol 34 (1) ◽  
pp. 157-170
Author(s):  
Muhammad Rais Abdillah ◽  
Yuki Kanno ◽  
Toshiki Iwasaki ◽  
Jun Matsumoto

AbstractCold surge occurrences are one of the robust features of winter monsoon in East Asia and are characterized by equatorward outbreaks of cold air from the high latitudes. Beside greatly affecting weather variability across the Far East, cold surges are of importance for Southeast Asian countries because they can propagate far to the tropics and excite convective activities. However, the tropical responses highly depend on the downstream pathways of the surges. To better understand how cold surges influence tropical weather, we investigate 160 cold surges identified using a quantitative approach during 40 winters from 1979/80 to 2018/19, and then classify them into several groups based on their prominent pathways. At the midlatitudes, we find two groups: one for surges that show clear equatorward propagation of cold air to lower latitudes and the other for surges that turn eastward and bring cold air to the North Pacific. These groups arise due to the strength difference of the Siberian high expansion controlled by cold air blocking near the Tibetan Plateau. The tropical impact is evident in the former group. We perform further classification on this group and find four types of surges based on their pathways in the low latitudes: 1) South China Sea (SCS) surges, 2) Philippines Sea (PHS) surges, 3) both SCS and PHS surges, and 4) blocked surges. They exhibit distinct precipitation signatures over the Maritime Continent, which are driven by interactions between the surges and the pre-existing synoptic conditions over the tropics, particularly the Madden–Julian oscillation (MJO).


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul-Arthur Monerie ◽  
Amulya Chevuturi ◽  
Peter Cook ◽  
Nick Klingaman ◽  
Christopher E. Holloway

Abstract. We assess the effect of increasing horizontal resolution on simulated precipitation over South America in a climate model. We use atmosphere-only simulations, performed with HadGEM3-GC31 at three horizontal resolutions: N96 (~ 130 km, 1.88° × 1.25°), N216 (~ 60 km, 0.83° × 0.56°), and N512 (~25 km, 0.35° × 0.23°). We show that all simulations have systematic biases in annual mean and seasonal mean precipitation over South America (e.g. too wet over the Amazon and too dry in northeast). Increasing horizontal resolution improves simulated precipitation over the Andes and north-east Brazil. Over the Andes, improvements from horizontal resolution continue to ~ 25 km, while over north-east Brazil, there are no improvements beyond ~ 60 km resolution. These changes are primarily related to changes in atmospheric dynamics and moisture flux convergence. Over the Amazon basin, precipitation variability increases at higher resolution. We show that some spatial and temporal features of daily South American precipitation are improved at high resolution, including the intensity spectra of rainfall. Spatial scales of daily precipitation features are also better simulated, suggesting that higher resolution may improve the representation of South American mesoscale convective systems.


1987 ◽  
Vol 65 (6) ◽  
pp. 1346-1353 ◽  
Author(s):  
R. E. Roughley ◽  
G. William Wolfe

Laccornellus, new genus, is proposed for two austral South American species previously assigned to Laccornis Gozis (L. lugubris (Aube, 1838), the type species, known from Argentina and Uruguay, and L. copelatoides (Sharp, 1882), known from Chile). The valvifer is absent in the adult stage of females of these species and the males have a greatly enlarged internal sac on the aedeagus; these characters exclude them from Laccornis. The most similar and possibly most closely related genus to Laccornellus is the African genus Canthyporus Zimmermann, although no conclusive synapotypy was found. Relationships of extant, plesiotypic hydroporines remain problematic; however, divergence of Laccornellus and Canthyporus probably began about 120 million years ago when Africa and South America separated. The vicariant event preceding divergence of L. copelatoides and L. lugubris probably was the uplift of the Andes Mountains which began in the late Oligocene – early Miocene.


2002 ◽  
Vol 29 (17) ◽  
pp. 7-1-7-4 ◽  
Author(s):  
Claudia M. Campetella ◽  
Carolina S. Vera

2020 ◽  
Vol 13 (10) ◽  
pp. 4749-4771
Author(s):  
Paul-Arthur Monerie ◽  
Amulya Chevuturi ◽  
Peter Cook ◽  
Nicholas P. Klingaman ◽  
Christopher E. Holloway

Abstract. We assess the effect of increasing horizontal resolution on simulated precipitation over South America in a climate model. We use atmosphere-only simulations, performed with HadGEM3-GC31 at three horizontal resolutions: N96 (∼130 km; 1.88∘×1.25∘), N216 (∼60 km; 0.83∘×0.56∘), and N512 (∼25 km; 0.35∘×0.23∘). We show that all simulations have systematic biases in annual mean and seasonal mean precipitation over South America (e.g. too wet over the Amazon and too dry in the northeast). Increasing horizontal resolution improves simulated precipitation over the Andes and northeast Brazil. Over the Andes, improvements from horizontal resolution continue to ∼25 km, while over northeast Brazil, there are no improvements beyond ∼60 km resolution. These changes are primarily related to changes in atmospheric dynamics and moisture flux convergence. Over the Amazon Basin, precipitation variability increases at higher resolution. We show that some spatial and temporal features of daily South American precipitation are improved at high resolution, including the intensity spectra of rainfall. Spatial scales of daily precipitation features are also better simulated, suggesting that higher resolution may improve the representation of South American mesoscale convective systems.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tiffany M. Doan ◽  
Sara A. Sheffer ◽  
Nicholas R. Warmington ◽  
Eliot E. Evans

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