On the role of the planetary boundary layer depth in the climate system

Esau, Igor; Zilitinkevich, Sergej

doi:10.5194/asr-4-63-2010

Cited by 52 publications

(41 citation statements)

References 33 publications

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“…Among the many processes that have been considered responsible for the Arctic amplification of climate warming, the sea ice decline is associated with the snow/ice-albedo feedback effect (Flanner et al 2011;Graversen and Wang 2009;Serreze and Barry 2011), increased heat loss from the ocean (Screen and Simmonds 2010a, b), the water vapour and cloud radiative feedbacks (Sedlar et al 2011), and the small heat capacity of the shallow stably stratified boundary layer (Esau and Zilitinkevich 2010). It should be noted that there is no general consensus on the relative importance of various factors responsible for the Arctic amplification and sea ice decline.…”

Section: Reasons For the Sea Ice Declinementioning

confidence: 99%

Effects of Arctic Sea Ice Decline on Weather and Climate: A Review

2014

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The areal extent, concentration and thickness of sea ice in the Arctic Ocean and adjacent seas have strongly decreased during the recent decades, but cold, snow-rich winters have been common over mid-latitude land areas since 2005. A review is presented on studies addressing the local and remote effects of the sea ice decline on weather and climate. It is evident that the reduction in sea ice cover has increased the heat flux from the ocean to atmosphere in autumn and early winter. This has locally increased air temperature, moisture, and cloud cover and reduced the static stability in the lower troposphere. Several studies based on observations, atmospheric reanalyses, and model experiments suggest that the sea ice decline, together with increased snow cover in Eurasia, favours circulation patterns resembling the negative phase of the North Atlantic Oscillation and Arctic Oscillation. The suggested large-scale pressure patterns include a high over Eurasia, which favours cold winters in Europe and northeastern Eurasia. A high over the western and a low over the eastern North America have also been suggested, favouring advection of Arctic air masses to North America. Mid-latitude winter weather is, however, affected by several other factors, which generate a large inter-annual variability and often mask the effects of sea ice decline. In addition, the small sample of years with a large sea ice loss makes it difficult to distinguish the effects directly attributable to sea ice conditions. Several studies suggest that, with advancing global warming, cold winters in mid-latitude continents will no longer be common during the second half of the twenty-first century. Recent studies have also suggested causal links between the sea ice decline and summer precipitation in Europe, the Mediterranean, and East Asia.

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Section: Reasons For the Sea Ice Declinementioning

confidence: 99%

Effects of Arctic Sea Ice Decline on Weather and Climate: A Review

2014

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“…A certain heat input results in a larger temperature increase in a shallow than in a deep ABL. As the ABL is typically shallow in the Arctic, this may have contributed to the Arctic amplification of climate warming (Esau and Zilitinkevich, 2010;Esau et al, 2012). It is, however, not a positive feedback, as heating of the ABL tends to increase its thickness.…”

Section: Feedback Mechanismsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Flanner et al, 2011;Hudson, 2011); in addition to its direct effect, it enhances the Arctic amplification by strengthening the water vapour and cloud radiative feedbacks (Graversen and Wang, 2009). Further, feedbacks related to the shape of the temperature profile (Pithan and Mauritsen, 2014), the small heat capacity of the shallow stably stratified boundary layer (Esau and Zilitinkevich, 2010) and increased autumn-winter energy loss from the ocean (Overland et al, 2008;Screen and Simmonds, 2010a) tend to amplify Arctic warming as do the effects of aerosols. It has been suggested that black carbon aerosols reduce the surface albedo (e.g.…”

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confidence: 99%

Advances in understanding and parameterization of small-scale physical processes in the marine Arctic climate system: a review

et al. 2014

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Abstract. The Arctic climate system includes numerous highly interactive small-scale physical processes in the atmosphere, sea ice, and ocean. During and since the International Polar Year 2007-2009, significant advances have been made in understanding these processes. Here, these recent advances are reviewed, synthesized, and discussed. In atmospheric physics, the primary advances have been in cloud physics, radiative transfer, mesoscale cyclones, coastal, and fjordic processes as well as in boundary layer processes and surface fluxes. In sea ice and its snow cover, advances have been made in understanding of the surface albedo and its relationships with snow properties, the internal structure of sea ice, the heat and salt transfer in ice, the formation of superimposed ice and snow ice, and the small-scale dynamics of sea ice. For the ocean, significant advances have been related to exchange processes at the ice-ocean interface, diapycnal mixing, double-diffusive convection, tidal currents and diurnal resonance. Despite this recent progress, some of these small-scale physical processes are still not sufficiently understood: these include wave-turbulence interactions in the atmosphere and ocean, the exchange of heat and salt at the ice-ocean interface, and the mechanical weakening of sea ice. Many other processes are reasonably well understood as stand-alone processes but the challenge is to understand their interactions with and impacts and feedbacks on other processes. Uncertainty in the parameterization of small-scale processes continues to be among the greatest challenges facing climate modelling, particularly in high latitudes. Further improvements in parameterization require new year-round field campaigns on the Arctic sea ice, closely combined with satellite remote sensing studies and numerical model experiments.

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“…It is now generally recognized that peculiarities of the stable ABL, including wave activity, affect not only regional weather, but also the general circulation of the atmosphere (see, e.g. Zilitinkevich and Esau 2003;Esau and Zilitinkevich 2010;Holtslag et al 2013;McGrath-Spangler et al 2015). A poor understanding of the exchange processes in the stable ABL and difficulties in its parametrization inhibit the development of numerical modelling of regional and local weather (Mahrt 1998;Cohen et al 2015).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Wavelike Structures in the Turbulent Layer During the Morning Development of Convection at Dome C, Antarctica

Petenko

Argentini

Casasanta

et al. 2016

Boundary-Layer Meteorol

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In the period January-February 2014, observations were made at the Concordia station, Dome C, Antarctica to study atmospheric turbulence in the boundary layer using a high-resolution sodar. The turbulence structure was observed beginning from the lowest height of about 2 m, with a vertical resolution of less than 2 m. Typical patterns of the diurnal evolution of the spatio-temporal structure of turbulence detected by the sodar are analyzed. Here, we focus on the wavelike processes observed within the transition period from stable to unstable stratification occurring in the morning hours. Thanks to the high-resolution sodar measurements during the development of the convection near the surface, clear undulations were detected in the overlying turbulent layer for a significant part of the time. The wavelike pattern exhibits a regular braid structure, with undulations associated with internal gravity waves attributed to Kelvin-Helmholtz shear instability. The main spatial and temporal scales of the wavelike structures were determined, with predominant periodicity of the observed wavy patterns estimated to be 40-50 s. The horizontal scales roughly estimated using Taylor's frozen turbulence hypothesis are about 250-350 m.

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On the role of the planetary boundary layer depth in the climate system

Cited by 52 publications

References 33 publications

Effects of Arctic Sea Ice Decline on Weather and Climate: A Review

Effects of Arctic Sea Ice Decline on Weather and Climate: A Review

Advances in understanding and parameterization of small-scale physical processes in the marine Arctic climate system: a review

Wavelike Structures in the Turbulent Layer During the Morning Development of Convection at Dome C, Antarctica

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