Investigating the Role of Ocean–Atmosphere Coupling in the North Pacific Ocean (original) (raw)

Intraseasonal variability in the far-east pacific: investigation of the role of air–sea coupling in a regional coupled model

2011

Abstract Intraseasonal variability in the eastern Pacific warm pool in summer is studied, using a regional ocean–atmosphere model, a linear baroclinic model (LBM), and satellite observations. The atmospheric component of the model is forced by lateral boundary conditions from reanalysis data. The aim is to quantify the importance to atmospheric deep convection of local air–sea coupling. In particular, the effect of sea surface temperature (SST) anomalies on surface heat fluxes is examined.

The impact of internal atmospheric variability on the North Pacific SST variability

Climate dynamics, 2004

The impact of internal atmospheric variability on North Pacific sea surface temperature (SST) variability is examined based on three coupled general circulation model simulations. The three simulations differ only in the level of atmospheric noise occuring over the ocean at the air-sea interface. The amplitude of atmospheric noise is controlled by use of the interactive ensemble technique. This technique simultaneously couples multiple realizations of a single atmospheric model to a single realization of an ocean model. The atmospheric component models all experience the same SST, but the ocean component is forced by the ensemble averaged fluxes thereby reducing the impact of internal atmospheric dynamics at the air-sea interface. The ensemble averaging is only applied at the air-sea interface so that the internal atmospheric dynamics (i.e., transients) of each atmospheric ensemble member is unaffected. This interactive ensemble technique significantly reduces the SST variance throughout the North Pacific. The reduction in SST variance is proportional to the number of ensemble members indicating that most of the variability can simply be explained as the response to atmospheric stochastic forcing. In addition, the impact of the internal atmospheric dynamics at the air-sea interface masks out much of the tropical-midlatitude SST teleconnections on interannual time scales. Once this interference is reduced (i.e., applying the interactive ensemble technique), tropical-midlatitude SST teleconnections are easily detected.

The role of ocean dynamics in producing decadal climate variability in the North Pacific

Climate Dynamics, 2001

Decadal time scale climate variability in the North Paci®c has implications for climate both locally and over North America. A crucial question is the degree to which this variability arises from coupled ocean/ atmosphere interactions over the North Paci®c that involve ocean dynamics, as opposed to either purely thermodynamic eects of the oceanic mixed layer integrating in situ the stochastic atmospheric forcing, or the teleconnected response to tropical variability. The part of the variability that is coming from local coupled ocean/atmosphere interactions involving ocean dynamics is potentially predictable by an ocean/atmosphere general circulation model (O/A GCM), and such predictions could (depending on the achievable lead time) have distinct societal bene®ts. This question is examined using the results of fully coupled O/A GCMs, as well as targeted numerical experiments with stand-alone ocean and atmosphere models individually. It is found that coupled ocean/atmosphere interactions that involve ocean dynamics are important to determining the strength and frequency of a decadal-time scale peak in the spectra of several oceanic variables in the Kuroshio extension region o Japan. Local stochastic atmospheric heat¯ux forcing, integrated by the oceanic mixed layer into a red spectrum, provides a noise background from which the signal must be extracted. Although teleconnected ENSO responses in¯uence the North Paci®c in the 2±7 years/cycle frequency band, it is shown that some decadal-time scale processes in the North Paci®c proceed without ENSO. Likewise, although the eects of stochastic atmospheric forcing on ocean dynamics are discernible, a feedback path from the ocean to the atmosphere is suggested by the results.

Coupled Decadal Variability in the North Pacific: An Observationally Constrained Idealized Model*

Journal of Climate, 2007

Air-sea coupled variability is investigated in this study by focusing on the observed sea surface temperature signals in the Kuroshio Extension (KE) region of 32°-38°N and 142°E-180°. In this region, both the oceanic circulation variability and the heat exchange variability across the air-sea interface are the largest in the midlatitude North Pacific. SST variability in the KE region has a dominant time scale of ϳ10 yr and this decadal variation is caused largely by the regional, wind-induced sea surface height changes that represent the lateral migration and strengthening/weakening of the KE jet. The importance of the air-sea coupling in influencing KE jet is explored by dividing the large-scale wind forcing into those associated with the intrinsic atmospheric variability and those induced by the SST changes in the KE region. The latter signals are extracted from the NCEP-NCAR reanalysis data using the lagged correlation analysis. In the absence of the SST feedback, the intrinsic atmospheric forcing enhances the decadal and longer time-scale SST variance through oceanic advection but fails to capture the observed decadal spectral peak. When the SST feedback is present, a warm (cold) KE SST anomaly works to generate a positive (negative) wind stress curl in the eastern North Pacific basin, resulting in negative (positive) local sea surface height (SSH) anomalies through Ekman divergence (convergence). As these wind-forced SSH anomalies propagate into the KE region in the west, they shift the KE jet and alter the sign of the preexisting SST anomalies. Given the spatial pattern of the SST-induced wind stress curl forcing, the optimal coupling in the midlatitude North Pacific occurs at the period of ϳ10 yr, slightly longer than the basin-crossing time of the baroclinic Rossby waves along the KE latitude. * IPRC Contribution Number 437.

Modeling the Low-Frequency Sea Surface Temperature Variability in the North Pacific

J. Climate, 1992

The question of whether the large-scale low-frequency sea surface temperature (SST) variability in the North Pacific can be interpreted as a response to large-scale wind anomalies is studied by an ocean general circulation model coupled to an advective model for the air temperature. Forced with observed monthly mean winds, the model is successful in reproducing the main space and time characteristics of the large-scale low-frequency SST variability. In winter also the simulated and observed SSTs are highly correlated. The dominant process in producing wintertime SST tendencies is the anomalous turbulent heat exchange with the atmosphere that is parameterized by the bulk aerodynamic formula and takes into account the simulated air temperature, the simulated SST, and the observed winds. The oceanic response to turbulent momentum fluxes is much smaller. The horizontal scale of the simulated air temperature is induced by advective transports with the observed winds and transferred to the ocean by anomalous turbulent latent and sensible heat fluxes. The ocean response is lagging the atmospheric forcing by about one month and persists over much longer time than the atmospheric anomalies, particularly in winter. Part of the observed low-frequency SST variance can be explained by teleconnection. A wind field that is directly related to the tropical El Nino-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) phenomenon produces SST anomalies with an ENSO-related variance of more than 50% instead of I 0% to 30% as observed.

Extratropical Air‐Sea Interaction, Sea Surface Temperature Variability, and the Pacific Decadal Oscillation

We examine processes that influence North Pacific sea surface temperature (SST) anomalies including surface heat fluxes, upper ocean mixing, thermocline variability, ocean currents, and tropical-extratropical interactions via the atmosphere and ocean. The ocean integrates rapidly varying atmospheric heat flux and wind forcing, and thus a stochastic model of the climate system, where white noise forcing produces a red spectrum, appears to provide a baseline for SST variability even on decadal time scales. However, additional processes influence Pacific climate variability including the "reemergence mechanism," where seasonal variability in mixed layer depth allows surface temperature anomalies to be stored at depth during summer and return to the surface in the following winter. Wind stress curl anomalies in the central/east Pacific drive thermocline variability that propagates to the west Pacific via baroclinic Rossby waves and influences SST by vertical mixing and the change in strength and position of the ocean gyres. Atmospheric changes associated with the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) also influence North Pacific SST anomalies via the "atmospheric bridge." The dominant pattern of North Pacific SST anomalies, the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO), exhibits variability on interannual as well as decadal time scales. Unlike ENSO, the PDO does not appear to be a mode of the climate system, but rather it results from several different mechanisms including (1) stochastic heat flux forcing associated with random fluctuations in the Aleutian Low, (2) the atmospheric bridge augmented by the reemergence mechanism, and (3) wind-driven changes in the North Pacific gyres.

Anatomy of North Pacific Decadal Variability

Journal of Climate, 2002

A systematic analysis of North Pacific decadal variability in a full-physics coupled ocean-atmosphere model is executed. The model is an updated and improved version of the coupled model studied by Latif and Barnett. Evidence is sought for determining the details of the mechanism responsible for the enhanced variance of some variables at 20-30-yr timescales. The possible mechanisms include a midlatitude gyre ocean-atmosphere feedback loop, stochastic forcing, remote forcing, or sampling error.

On the effect of the East/Japan Sea SST variability on the North Pacific atmospheric circulation in a regional climate model

Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres, 2014

The East/Japan Sea (EJS) is a semi-enclosed marginal sea located in the upstream of the North Pacific storm track, where the leading modes of wintertime interannual variability in sea surface temperature (SST) are characterized by the basin-wide warming-cooling and the northeast-southwest dipole. Processes leading to local and remote atmospheric responses to these SST anomalies are investigated using the Weather Research and Forecast (WRF) model. The atmosphere in direct contact with anomalous diabatic forcing exhibits a linear and symmetric response with respect to the sign, pattern, and magnitude of SST anomalies, producing increased (decreased) wind speed and precipitation response over warm (cold) SSTs. This local response is due to modulation of both the vertical stability of the marine atmospheric boundary layer and the adjustment of sea level pressure, although the latter provides a better explanation of the quadrature relationship between SST and wind speed. The linearity in the local response suggests the importance of fine-scale EJS SSTs to predictability of the regional weather and climate variability. The remote circulation response, in contrast, is strongly nonlinear. An intraseasonal equivalent barotropic ridge emerges in the Gulf of Alaska as a common remote response independent of EJS SST anomalies. This downstream blocking response is reinforced by the enhanced storm track variability east of Japan via transient eddy vorticity flux convergence. Strong nonlinearity in remote response implies that detailed EJS SST patterns may not be critical to this downstream ridge response. Overall, results demonstrate a remarkably far-reaching impact of the EJS SSTs on the atmospheric circulation.