scholarly journals Variations in Stratospheric Gravity Waves Derived from Temperature Observations of Multi-GNSS Radio Occultation Missions

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (23) ◽  
pp. 4835
Author(s):  
Jia Luo ◽  
Jialiang Hou ◽  
Xiaohua Xu

The spatial–temporal distribution of the global gravity wave (GW) potential energy (Ep) at the lower stratosphere of 20–35 km is studied using the dry temperature profiles from multi- Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) radio occultation (RO) missions, including CHAMP, COSMIC, GRACE, and METOP-A/B/C, during the 14 years from 2007 to 2020, based on which the linear trends of the GW Ep and the responses of GW Ep to solar activity, quasi biennial oscillation (QBO), and El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) are analyzed using the multivariate linear regression (MLR) method. It is found that the signs and the magnitudes of the trends of GW Ep during each month vary at different altitude ranges and over different latitudes. At 25–35 km of the middle and high latitudes, GW Ep values generally show significant negative trends in almost all months, and the values of the negative trends become smaller in the regions closer to the poles. The distribution of the deseasonalized trends in the monthly zonal-mean GW Ep demonstrates that the GW activities are generally declining from 2007 to 2020 over the globe. The responses of GW Ep to solar activity are found to be mostly positive at 20–35 km over the globe, and the comparison between the distribution pattern of the deseasonalized trends in the GW activities and that of the responses of GWs to solar activity indicates that the sharp decline in solar activity from 2015 to 2017 might contribute to the overall attenuation of gravity wave activity during the 14 years. Significant negative responses of GW Ep to QBO are found at 30–35 km over 30° S–25° N, and the negative responses extend to the mid and high latitudes in the southern hemisphere at 20–30 km. The responses of GW Ep to QBO change to be significantly positive at 20–30 km over 15° S–15° N, which demonstrates that the zonal wind field should be the main factor affecting the GW activities at 20–30 km over the tropics. The responses of GW Ep at 20–35 km to ENSO are found to be positive over 15° S–15° N, while at 30–35 km over 15° N–30° N and at 20–35 km near 50° N, significant negative responses of GW Ep to ENSO exist.

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wentao Tang ◽  
Shao Dong ZHANG ◽  
Chun Ming HUANG ◽  
Kai Ming HUANG ◽  
Yun Gong ◽  
...  

Abstract The global amplitude of the westward propagating quasi-16-day wave (16DW) with wavenumber 1 (Q16W1), the strongest component of 16DW, is derived from European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts ERA-Interim reanalysis temperature data set from February 1979 to January 2018. The strong climatological mean amplitudes of the Q16W1 appear in winter in the upper stratosphere at high latitudes in both hemispheres, and the wave amplitude is stronger in the Northern Hemisphere (NH) than in the Southern Hemisphere (SH). Multivariate linear regression is applied to calculate responses of the Q16W1 amplitude to QBO (quasi-biennial oscillation), ENSO (El Niño-Southern Oscillation), solar activity and the linear trend of the Q16W1 amplitude. The QBO signatures of the Q16W1 amplitude are mainly located in the stratosphere. In addition to the significant QBO response in the low latitude and low stratosphere, the largest QBO response occurs in the region with the strongest Q16W1 climatology amplitude. There no significant responses to ENSO and solar activity are observed. The linear trend of the monthly mean Q16W1 amplitude is generally positive, especially in the mid-high latitudes of the stratosphere. The trend is asymmetric about the equator and significantly stronger in the NH than in the SH. The trend shows obvious seasonal changes, that is, stronger in winter, weaker in spring and autumn. Further investigation suggests that the background and local instability trends contribute most of the increasing trend of the Q16W1 amplitude. In winter in both hemispheres, the weakening trend of eastward zonal wind provide more favourable background wind for Q16W1 upward propagation, in autumn and winter in the NH and in spring, autumn and winter in the SH, the increasing trend of local instability may enhance the wave excitation.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elżbieta Lasota ◽  
Andrea K. Steiner ◽  
Gottfried Kirchengast ◽  
Riccardo Biondi

Abstract. Tropical Cyclones (TC) are natural destructive phenomena, which affect wide tropical and subtropical areas every year. Although the correct prediction of their tracks and intensity has improved over recent years, the knowledge about their structure and development is still insufficient. The Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) Radio Occultation (RO) technique can provide a better understanding of the TC because it enables to probe the atmospheric vertical structure with high accuracy, high vertical resolution, and global coverage in any weather conditions. In this work, we create an archive of co-located TC best tracks and RO profiles covering the period 2001–2018 and providing a complete view of the storms since the pre-cyclone status to the cyclone disappearance. We collected 1822 TC best tracks from the International Best Track Archive for Climate Stewardship and co-located them with 48313 RO profiles from seven satellite missions processed by Wegener Center for Climate and Global Change. We provide information about location and intensity of the TC, RO vertical profiles co-located within 3 hours and 500 km from the TC eye centre, and exact information about temporal and spatial distance between the TC centre and the RO mean tangent point. A statistical analysis shows how the archive well covers all the ocean basins and all the intensity categories. We finally demonstrate the application of this dataset to investigate the vertical structure for one TC example case. All the data files, separately for each TC, are publicly available in NetCDF format at https://doi.org/10.25364/WEGC/TC-RO1.0:2020.1 (Lasota et al., 2020).


2019 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Yang-Yi Sun

AbstractBoth solar activities from above and perturbations of Earth’s surface and troposphere from below disturb ionospheric structure and its dynamics. Numerous ionospheric phenomena remain unexplained due to the complicated nature of the solar–terrestrial environment. We do appreciate the ground- and space-based Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) techniques being around and providing global observations with high resolutions to help us to resolve unexplained phenomena. This paper summarizes recent studies of the effect of solar (geomagnetic storm and total solar eclipse), tropospheric (typhoon, walker circulation, and El Niño-Southern Oscillation), and earthquake/tsunami activities (2010 Chile, 2011 Tohoku, and 2015 Nepal earthquakes) on the ionosphere utilizing the global ground- and space-based GNSS observations.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mohamadou Diallo ◽  
Manfred Ern ◽  
Felix Ploeger

Abstract. The stratospheric Brewer-Dobson circulation (BDC) is an important element of climate as it determines the transport and distributions of key radiatively active atmospheric trace gases, which affect the Earth’s radiation budget and surface climate. Here, we evaluate the inter-annual variability and trends of the BDC in the ERA5 reanalysis and inter-compare with the ERA-Interim reanalysis for the 1979–2018 period. We also assess the modulation of the circulation by the Quasi-Biennial Oscillation (QBO) and the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO), and the forcings of the circulation by the planetary and gravity wave drag. A comparison of ERA5 and ERA-Interim reanalyses shows a very good agreement in the morphology of the BDC and in its structural modulations by the natural variability related to QBO and ENSO. Despite the good agreement in the spatial structure, there are substantial differences in the strength of the BDC and of the natural variability impacts on the BDC between the two reanalyses, particularly in the upper troposphere and lower stratosphere (UTLS), and in the upper stratosphere. Throughout most regions of the stratosphere, the variability and trends of the advective BDC are stronger in the ERA5 reanalysis due to stronger planetary and gravity wave forcings, except in the UTLS below 20 km where the tropical upwelling is about 40 % weaker due to a weaker gravity wave forcings at the equatorial flank of the subtropical jet. In the extra-tropics, the large-scale downwelling is stronger in ERA5 than in ERA-Interim linked to significant differences in planetary and gravity wave forcings. Analysis of the BDC trend shows a global acceleration of the annual mean residual circulation with an acceleration rate of about 1.5 % per decade at 70 hPa due to the long-term intensification in gravity and planetary wave breaking, consistent with observed and future climate model predicted BDC changes.


2020 ◽  
Vol 10 ◽  
pp. 56
Author(s):  
Antti Salminen ◽  
Timo Asikainen ◽  
Ville Maliniemi ◽  
Kalevi Mursula

Northern polar vortex experiences significant variability during Arctic winter. Solar activity contributes to this variability via solar irradiance and energetic particle precipitation. Recent studies have found that energetic electron precipitation (EEP) affects the polar vortex by forming ozone depleting NOx compounds. However, it is still unknown how the EEP effect compares to variabilities caused by, e.g., solar irradiance or terrestrial drivers. In this study we examine the effects of EEP, solar irradiance, El-Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO), volcanic aerosols and quasi-biennial oscillation (QBO) on the northern wintertime atmosphere. We use geomagnetic Ap-index to quantify EEP activity, sunspot numbers to quantify solar irradiance, Niño 3.4 index for ENSO and aerosol optical depth for the amount of volcanic aerosols. We use a new composite dataset including ERA-40 and ERA-Interim reanalysis of zonal wind and temperature and multilinear regression analysis to estimate atmospheric responses to the above mentioned explaining variables in winter months of 1957–2017. We confirm the earlier results showing that EEP and QBO strengthen the polar vortex. We find here that the EEP effect on polar vortex is stronger and more significant than the effects of the other drivers in almost all winter months in most conditions. During 1957–2017 the considered drivers together explain about 25–35% of polar vortex variability while the EEP effect alone explains about 10–20% of it. Thus, a major part of variability is not due to the linear effect by the studied explaining variables. The positive EEP effect is particularly strong if QBO-wind at 30 hPa has been easterly during the preceding summer, while for a westerly QBO the EEP effect is weaker and less significant.


2010 ◽  
Vol 10 (12) ◽  
pp. 30453-30471
Author(s):  
I. Roy ◽  
J. D. Haigh

Abstract. We investigate an apparent inconsistency between two published results concerning the temperature of the winter polar stratosphere and its dependence on the state of the Sun and the phase of the Quasi-Biennial Oscillation (QBO). We find that the differences can be explained by the use of the authors of different pressure levels to define the phase of the QBO. We identify QBO and solar cycle signals in sea level pressure (SLP) data using a multiple linear regression approach. First we used a standard QBO time series dating back to 1953. In the SLP observations dating back to that time we find at high latitudes that individually the solar and QBO signals are weak but that a temporal index representing the combined effects of the Sun and the QBO shows a significant signal. This is such that combinations of low solar activity with westerly QBO and high solar activity with easterly QBO are both associated with a strengthening in the polar modes; while the opposite combinations coincide with a weakening. This result is true irrespective of the choice of QBO pressure level. By employing a QBO dataset reconstructed back to 1900, we extended the analysis and also find a robust signal in the surface SAM; though weaker for surface NAM. Our results suggest that solar variability, modulated by the phase of QBO, influences zonal mean temperatures at high latitudes in the lower stratosphere and subsequently affect sea level pressure near the poles. Thus a knowledge of the state of the Sun, and the phase of the QBO might be useful in surface climate prediction.


2018 ◽  
Vol 11 (10) ◽  
pp. 5797-5811 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yueqiang Sun ◽  
Weihua Bai ◽  
Congliang Liu ◽  
Yan Liu ◽  
Qifei Du ◽  
...  

Abstract. The Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) Occultation Sounder (GNOS) is one of the new-generation payloads on board the Chinese FengYun 3 (FY-3) series of operational meteorological satellites for sounding the Earth's neutral atmosphere and ionosphere. FY-3C GNOS, on board the FY-3 series C satellite launched in September 2013, was designed to acquire setting and rising radio occultation (RO) data by using GNSS signals from both the Chinese BeiDou Navigation Satellite System (BDS) and the US Global Positioning System (GPS). So far, the GNOS measurements and atmospheric and ionospheric data products have been validated and evaluated and then been used for atmosphere- and ionosphere-related scientific applications. This paper reviews the FY-3C GNOS instrument, RO data processing, data quality evaluation, and preliminary research applications according to the state-of-the-art status of the FY-3C GNOS mission and related publications. The reviewed data validation and application results demonstrate that the FY-3C GNOS mission can provide accurate and precise atmospheric and ionospheric GNSS (i.e., GPS and BDS) RO profiles for numerical weather prediction (NWP), global climate monitoring (GCM), and space weather research (SWR). The performance of the FY-3C GNOS product quality evaluation and scientific applications establishes confidence that the GNOS data from the series of FY-3 satellites will provide important contributions to NWP, GCM, and SWR scientific communities.


2014 ◽  
Vol 7 (11) ◽  
pp. 3947-3958 ◽  
Author(s):  
T. Rieckh ◽  
B. Scherllin-Pirscher ◽  
F. Ladstädter ◽  
U. Foelsche

Abstract. Characteristics of the lapse rate tropopause are analyzed globally for tropopause altitude and temperature using global positioning system (GPS) radio occultation (RO) data from late 2001 to the end of 2013. RO profiles feature high vertical resolution and excellent quality in the upper troposphere and lower stratosphere, which are key factors for tropopause determination, including multiple ones. RO data provide measurements globally and allow examination of both temporal and spatial tropopause characteristics based entirely on observational measurements. To investigate latitudinal and longitudinal tropopause characteristics, the mean annual cycle, and inter-annual variability, we use tropopauses from individual profiles as well as their statistical measures for zonal bands and 5° × 10° bins. The latitudinal structure of first tropopauses shows the well-known distribution with high (cold) tropical tropopauses and low (warm) extra-tropical tropopauses. In the transition zones (20 to 40° N/S), individual profiles reveal varying tropopause altitudes from less than 7 km to more than 17 km due to variability in the subtropical tropopause break. In this region, we also find multiple tropopauses throughout the year. Longitudinal variability is strongest at northern hemispheric mid latitudes and in the Asian monsoon region. The mean annual cycle features changes in amplitude and phase, depending on latitude. This is caused by different underlying physical processes (such as the Brewer–Dobson circulation – BDC) and atmospheric dynamics (such as the strong polar vortex in the southern hemispheric winter). Inter-annual anomalies of tropopause parameters show signatures of El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO), the quasi–biennial oscillation (QBO), and the varying strength of the polar vortex, including sudden stratospheric warming (SSW) events. These results are in good agreement with previous studies and underpin the high utility of the entire RO record for investigating latitudinal, longitudinal, and temporal tropopause characteristics globally.


2014 ◽  
Vol 7 (11) ◽  
pp. 3935-3946 ◽  
Author(s):  
Y. Liu ◽  
J. Xue

Abstract. This paper reviews the development of the global navigation satellite system (GNSS) radio occultation (RO) observations assimilation in the Global/Regional Assimilation and PrEdiction System (GRAPES) of China Meteorological Administration, including the choice of data to assimilate, the data quality control, the observation operator, the tuning of observation error, and the results of the observation impact experiments. The results indicate that RO data have a significantly positive effect on analysis and forecast at all ranges in GRAPES, not only in the Southern Hemisphere where conventional observations are lacking but also in the Northern Hemisphere where data are rich. It is noted that a relatively simple assimilation and forecast system in which only the conventional and RO observation are assimilated still has analysis and forecast skill even after nine months integration, and the analysis difference between both hemispheres is gradually reduced with height when compared with NCEP (National Centers for Environmental Prediction) analyses. Finally, as a result of the new on-board payload of the Chinese FengYun-3 (FY-3) satellites, the research status of the RO of FY-3 satellites is also presented.


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