An aquaplanet atmospheric general circulation model simulation with a robust intraseasonal oscillation is analyzed. The SST boundary condition resembles the observed December-April average with continents omitted, although with the meridional SST gradient reduced to be one-quarter of that observed poleward of 10˚latitude. Slow, regular eastward propagation at 5 m s 21 in winds and precipitation with amplitude greater than that in the observed MJO is clearly identified in unfiltered fields. Local precipitation rate is a strongly non-linear and increasing function of column precipitable water, as in observations. The model intraseasonal oscillation resembles a moisture mode that is destabilized by wind-evaporation feedback, and that propagates eastward through advection of anomalous humidity by the sum of perturbation winds and mean westerly flow.A series of sensitivity experiments are conducted to test hypothesized mechanisms. A mechanism denial experiment in which intraseasonal latent heat flux variability is removed largely eliminates intraseasonal wind and precipitation variability. Reducing the lower-troposphere westerly flow in the warm pool by reducing the zonal SST gradient slows eastward propagation, supporting the importance of horizontal advection by the low-level wind to eastward propagation. A zonally symmetric SST basic state produces weak and unrealistic intraseasonal variability between 30 and 90 day timescales, indicating the importance of mean low-level westerly winds and hence a realistic phase relationship between precipitation and surface flux anomalies for producing realistic tropical intraseasonal variability.

The sensitivity of a simulated Madden-Julian oscillation (MJO) was investigated in the NCAR Community Atmosphere Model 3.1 with the relaxed Arakawa-Schubert convection scheme by analyzing the model's response to varying the strength of two moisture sensitivity parameters. A higher value of either the minimum entrainment rate or rain evaporation fraction results in increased intraseasonal variability, a more coherent MJO, and enhanced moisture-convection feedbacks in the model. Changes to the mean state are inconsistent between the two methods. Increasing the minimum entrainment leads to a cooler and drier troposphere, whereas increasing the rain evaporation fraction causes warming and moistening. These results suggest that no straightforward correspondence exists between the MJO and the mean humidity, contrary to previous studies.Analysis of the mean column-integrated and normalized moist static energy (MSE) budget reveals a substantial reduction of gross moist stability (GMS) for increased minimum entrainment, while no significant changes are found for an increased evaporation fraction. However, when considering fluctuations of the normalized MSE budget terms during MJO events, both methods result in negative GMS prior to the deep convective phase of the MJO. Intraseasonal fluctuations of GMS, rather than the mean, appear to be a better diagnostic quantity for testing a model's ability to produce an MJO.

The Dynamics of the MJO (DYNAMO) field campaign took place in the Indian Ocean during boreal fall and winter of 2011-2012 to collect observations of Madden-Julian Oscillation (MJO) initiation. Hindcast experiments are conducted with an atmospheric general circulation model with varying values of a dilute CAPE entrainment rate parameter for the first two MJO events of DYNAMO from 1 October 2011 to 15 December 2011. Higher entrainment rates better reproduce MJO precipitation and zonal wind, with RMM skill up to 20 days. Simulations with lower entrainment rapidly diverge from observations with no coherent MJO convective signal after 5 days, and no MJO predictive skill beyond 12 days. Analysis of the tropical Indian Ocean column moist static energy (MSE) budget reveals that the simulations with superior MJO performance exhibit a mean positive MSE tendency by vertical advection; inconsistent with reanalysis that indicates a weak negative tendency. All simulations have weaker mean MSE source tendency and significantly weaker cloud-radiative feedbacks. The vertical gross moist stability (VGMS) is used to interpret these MSE budget results in a normalized framework relevant to moisture mode theory. VGMS in the high entrainment runs is far too low compared to ERAi, indicating that it cannot be used in isolation as a measure of model success in producing a realistic MJO hindcast, contrary to previous studies. However, effective VGMS that includes radiative feedbacks is similar among the high entrainment runs and ERAi. We conclude that the MJO is erroneously improved by increasing the entrainment parameter because moistening by vertical MSE advection compensates for the overly weak cloud-radiative feedbacks.

This work documents version two of the Department of Energy's Energy Exascale Earth SystemModel (E3SM). E3SMv2 is a significant evolution from its predecessor E3SMv1, resulting in a model that is nearly twice as fast and with a simulated climate that is improved in many metrics. We describe the physical climate model in its lower horizontal resolution configuration consisting of 110 km atmosphere, 165 km land, 0.5° river routing model, and an ocean and sea ice with mesh spacing varying between 60 km in the mid-latitudes and 30 km at the equator and poles. The model performance is evaluated with Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 6 Diagnosis, Evaluation, and Characterization of Klima simulations augmented with historical simulations as well as simulations to evaluate impacts of different forcing agents. The simulated climate has many realistic features of the climate system, with notable improvements in clouds and precipitation compared to E3SMv1. E3SMv1 suffered from an excessively high equilibrium climate sensitivity (ECS) of 5.3 K. In E3SMv2, ECS is reduced to 4.0 K which is now within the plausible range based on a recent World Climate Research Program assessment. However, a number of important biases remain including a weak Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation, deficiencies in the characteristics and spectral distribution of tropical atmospheric variability, and a significant underestimation of the observed warming in the second half of the historical period. An analysis of single-forcing simulations indicates that correcting the historical temperature bias would require a substantial reduction in the magnitude of the aerosol-related forcing.

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