Arctic Cloud Response to a Perturbation in Sea Ice Concentration: The North Water Polynya

Monroe, E. E.; Taylor, Patrick C.; Boisvert, Linette N.

doi:10.1029/2020jd034409

Cited by 12 publications

(24 citation statements)

References 89 publications

(155 reference statements)

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“…This can moisten the boundary layer and create more and denser clouds, in particular in colder seasons when the stronger atmospheric radiative cooling favors upward transport of moisture from the ocean (Kay and Gettelman 2009). The finding of more and denser clouds due to melting sea ice in nonsummer seasons is confirmed by observations at different spatial-temporal scales (Wall et al 2017;Morrison et al 2018;Barton et al 2012;Eastman and Warren 2010;Palm et al 2010;Monroe et al 2021;Taylor et al 2015) and by some climate models (Wall et al 2017;Kay and Gettelman 2009;Morrison et al 2019). Despite the consensus on the qualitative behavior of cloud response to melting sea ice, the uncertainty of its representation in climate models remains large.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 79%

Low-Level Cloud Budgets across Sea Ice Edges

Zheng

Ming

2023

Journal of Climate

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Interpreting behaviors of low-level clouds (LLCs) in a climate model is often not straightforward. This is particularly so over polar oceans where frozen and unfrozen surfaces coexist, with horizontal winds streaming across them, shaping LLCs. To add clarity to this interpretation issue, we conduct budget analyses of LLCs using a global atmosphere model with a fully prognostic cloud scheme. After substantiating the model’s skill in reproducing observed LLCs, we use the modeled budgets of cloud fraction and water content to elucidate physics governing changes of LLCs across sea ice edges. Contrasting LLC regimes between open water and sea ice are found. LLCs over sea ice are primarily maintained by large-scale condensation: intermittent intrusions of maritime humid air and surface radiative cooling jointly sustain high relative humidity near the surface, forming extensive but tenuous stratus. This contrasts with the LLCs over open water where the convection and boundary layer condensation sustain the LLCs on top of deeper boundary layers. Such contrasting LLC regimes are influenced by the direction of horizontal advection. During on-ice flow, large-scale condensation dominates the regions, both open water and sea ice regions, forming clouds throughout the lowest several kilometers of the troposphere. During off-ice flow, as cold air masses travel over the open water, the cloud layer lifts and becomes denser, driven by increased surface fluxes that generate LLCs through boundary-layer condensation and convective detrainment. These results hold in all seasons except summer when the atmosphere-surface decoupling substantially reduces the footprints of surface type changes.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 79%

Low-Level Cloud Budgets across Sea Ice Edges

Zheng

Ming

2023

Journal of Climate

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“…This method has regularly been applied for AIRS-based surface turbulent flux calculation (Boisvert et al, 2013(Boisvert et al, , 2015Monroe et al, 2021) with some modifications, including stable conditions and roughness lengths estimation of sea ice (Andreas et al, 2010a(Andreas et al, , 2010bGrachev et al, 2007). The 1,000 hPa air temperature and specific humidity measured at different heights are consistently interpolated to a 2 m reference height until surface stability parameter (roughness length is divided by Monin-Obukhov length) is approaching convergence (less than 0.01).…”

Section: Turbulent Fluxmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sea Ice Production in the 2016 and 2017 Maud Rise Polynyas

2023

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Polynyas are regions of low sea ice concentration (SIC) or thickness where the comparatively warm ocean is exposed to the cold atmosphere. Coastal polynyas are mainly driven by katabatic winds, while sensible heat convection results in open-ocean/offshore polynyas (Morales Maqueda et al., 2004). Morales Maqueda et al. ( 2004) (and references therein) summarized that air-ice-ocean interactions in polynyas could impact: (a) the moisture and heat exchange between atmosphere and ocean and, therefore, the local wind dynamics; (b) the upper ocean properties and vertical flows of dense saline water through brine rejection and buoyancy loss; (c) the biogeochemical fluxes, for example, acting as the sinks of atmospheric CO 2 , between air and sea; and (d) the local ecosystems with extra phytoplankton and zooplankton, serving as "oases" in a polar ocean desert. In the Southern Ocean, open-ocean polynyas rarely occur but can reach a large extent. Such an open-ocean polynya, the Maud Rise polynya, opened in the vicinity of the Maud Rise seamount (centered on 64°S and 3°E)

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“…This method has regularly been applied for AIRS-based surface turbulent flux calculation (L. N. Boisvert et al, 2013Boisvert et al, , 2015Monroe et al, 2021) with some modifications, including stable conditions and roughness lengths estimation of sea ice from Grachev et al (2007); ; . The 1000 hPa air temperature and specific humidity measured at different heights are consistently interpolated to a 2 m reference height based on the iterative process.…”

Section: Turbulent Fluxmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sea ice production in the 2016 and 2017 Maud Rise polynyas

Zhou

Heuzé

Mohrmann

2022

Preprint

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Sea ice production within polynyas, an outcome of the atmosphere -ice -ocean interaction, is a major source of dense water and hence key to the global overturning circulation, but is poorly quantified over open-ocean polynyas. Using the two recent extensive open-ocean polynyas within the wider Maud Rise region of the Weddell Sea in 2016 and 2017, we here explore the surface ice energy budget and estimate their ice production based on satellite retrievals, in-situ hydrographic observations, and the Japanese 55-year Reanalysis (JRA55). We find that the oceanic heat flux amounts to 36.1 and 30.7 W m-2 within the 2016 and 2017 polynyas, respectively. We find that the 2017 open-ocean polynya produced nearly 200 km3 of new sea ice, which is comparable to the production in the largest Antarctic coastal polynyas. Finally, we find that ice production is highly correlated with the 2 m air temperature and wind speed, which affect the turbulent fluxes. It is also highly sensitive to uncertainties in the atmospheric air temperature and mixed layer depth, which urgently need to be better monitored at high latitudes.

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Arctic Cloud Response to a Perturbation in Sea Ice Concentration: The North Water Polynya

Cited by 12 publications

References 89 publications

Low-Level Cloud Budgets across Sea Ice Edges

Low-Level Cloud Budgets across Sea Ice Edges

Sea Ice Production in the 2016 and 2017 Maud Rise Polynyas

Sea ice production in the 2016 and 2017 Maud Rise polynyas

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