The north-east North Atlantic Tripole implicated as a predictor of the August precipitation decadal variability over north China

doi:10.1007/s11707-022-1008-z

Front. Earth Sci.

2023, Vol. 17

Issue (2) : 547-560 https://doi.org/10.1007/s11707-022-1008-z

RESEARCH ARTICLE

The north-east North Atlantic Tripole implicated as a predictor of the August precipitation decadal variability over north China

Tiejun XIE¹, Ji WANG¹, Peiqun ZHANG², Taichen FENG³, Xiaoxiao ZHANG¹, Yingjuan ZHANG¹(

)

¹. Beijing Municipal Climate Center, Beijing Meteorological Bureau, Beijing 100089, China
². National Climate Center, China Meteorological Administration, Beijing 100081, China
³. Key Laboratory for Semi-Arid Climate Change of the Ministry of Education, College of Atmospheric Sciences, Lanzhou University, Lanzhou 730000, China

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Abstract

Monthly precipitation over north China in August (NCAP) is the second highest in the year, and it is important to understand its driving mechanisms to facilitate reliable forecasting. The NCAP displays a significant decadal variability of a cycle about 10-year and negatively correlates with the July north-east North Atlantic Tripole (NAT) over the decadal timescales. This study shows that the Eurasian decadal teleconnection (EAT) acts as a bridge that links the July NAT with NCAP decadal variability. This coupled ocean–atmosphere bridge (COAB) mechanism, through which the July NAT influences the decadal variability of NCAP, can be summarized as follows. The cumulative effect of the NAT drives the EAT to adjust atmospheric circulation over north China and the surrounding regions, and so regulates precipitation in north China by influencing local water vapor transport. When the July NAT is in a negative (positive) phase, the EAT pattern has a positive (negative) pattern, which promotes (weakens) the transmission of water vapor from the sea in the south-east to north China, thus increasing (decreasing) NCAP over decadal timescales. The decadal NCAP model established based on the July NAT can effectively predict the NCAP decadal variability, illustrating that the July NAT can be implicated as a predictor of the NCAP decadal variability.

Keywords north China August precipitation (NCAP) north-east North Atlantic Tripole (NAT) Eurasian decadal teleconnection (EAT) pattern coupled oceanic-atmospheric bridge (COAB) decadal variability

Corresponding Author(s): Yingjuan ZHANG

Online First Date: 02 December 2022 Issue Date: 04 August 2023

Cite this article:

Tiejun XIE,Ji WANG,Peiqun ZHANG, et al. The north-east North Atlantic Tripole implicated as a predictor of the August precipitation decadal variability over north China[J]. Front. Earth Sci., 2023, 17(2): 547-560.

URL:

https://academic.hep.com.cn/fesci/EN/10.1007/s11707-022-1008-z
https://academic.hep.com.cn/fesci/EN/Y2023/V17/I2/547

Fig.1 Time series of annual NCAP anomalies. Area-weighted mean annual NCAP anomalies (bars) for 1979–2021, based on the GPCP data set. Solid green line and solid blue line are the annual NCAP anomalies after 7-year and 21-year low-pass Gaussian filtering, respectively.

Fig.2 Correlation coefficients of the August precipitation with the NCAP and NAT in north China. (a) Correlation between NCAP and August precipitation anomalies over north China and the surrounding region during 1979–2021 after 7-year Gaussian low-pass filtering. The researched north China region (35°?44°N, 110°?120°E) is surrounded by a blue box. The black dot indicates values significant values at the 95% confidence level using the effective number of degrees of freedom. (b) As in (a), but for the correlation coefficients of the August precipitation with the NAT index.

Fig.3 Power spectrum and wavelet power spectrum of annual NCAP anomalies. (a) Power spectrum of annual NCAP anomalies for 1979–2021 over decadal timescales. The blue (red) dashed line is the reference red noise spectrum (at the 95% confidence level). (b) As in (a), but for wavelet power spectrum. The dotted area indicates the 95% confidence level.

Fig.4 Time series of the NAT and detrended NCAP anomalies and its sliding-window correlation. (a) The dashed green (red) line is the time series of the detrended NCAP anomalies (NAT index) for 1979–2021. The solid green and red lines are the decadal variability of the detrended NCAP anomalies and NAT index for 1979–2021. (b) The blue line is the 17-year sliding-window correlation between the NAT and detrended NCAP anomalies (1979–2021) over decadal timescales. The two dashed lines indicate the 99% confidence level, calculated using the effective number of degrees of freedom.

Fig.5 Composite and composite difference of August geopotential height anomalies at 500 hPa corresponding to the NCAP anomalies. (a) Composite of August geopotential height anomalies at 500 hPa during the period when the NCAP is in positive phase over decadal timescales. (b) As in (a), but for the period when the NCAP is in negative phase. (c) As in (a), but for the composite difference between (a) and (b).

Fig.6 Horizontal stationary wave activity flux corresponding to the NCAP positive anomalies and associated with the EAT pattern. (a) Horizontal stationary wave activity flux at 500 hPa corresponding to the NCAP positive anomalies over decadal timescales, based on T-N wave activity flux. Contours and vectors indicate the velocity potential and divergent wind anomalies, respectively. (b) As in (a), but associated with the EAT pattern.

Fig.7 The regression coefficients of 500 hPa geopotential height anomalies against EAT index. (a) Regression coefficients of the normalized 500 hPa geopotential height anomalies over the North Atlantic-Eurasia (35°N–85°N, 60°W–150°E) against the EAT index for 1979–2021. Dotted areas indicate regression coefficients significant above the 95% confidence level, calculated using the effective number of degrees of freedom. (b) As in (a), but in the vertical direction for the regression coefficients of mean values of geopotential height at 45°–65°N against the EAT index.

Fig.8 Correlation coefficients between the EAT and SST. (a) Correlation coefficients between the EAT and detrended SST anomalies over the north-east Northern Atlantic over decadal timescales during 1979–2021. The dotted area indicates significant values above the 95% confidence level, calculated using the effective number of degrees of freedom. (b) as in (a), but using SST for August.

Fig.9 The regression coefficients of geopotential height anomalies and wind against the negative NAT. (a) As in Fig. 7(a), but for the geopotential height anomalies and zonal-meridional wind over the north-eastern Atlantic onto the negative NAT [NAT(-)]. (b) As in Fig. 7(b), but over the north-eastern Atlantic.

Fig.10 Lead–lag correlation between July NAT, August EAT and NCAP. (a) Lead–lag correlation between the July NAT and detrended NCAP anomalies for 1979–2021. The red and blue solid lines are the correlation coefficients for the raw and 7-year low-pass Gaussian low-pass filtered time series, respectively. Negative (positive) lags indicate that the NAT leads (lags) the NCAP. The red and blue dashed lines are the 95% confidence levels corresponding to raw and Gaussian low-pass filtered time series, respectively. (b) As in (a), but for August EAT and NCAP.

Fig.11 Regression coefficients of the 500 hPa zonal-meridional wind against EAT index and negative NAT. (a) As in Fig. 7(a), but for the zonal-meridional wind. (b) As in (a), but against negative NAT [NAT(-)].

Fig.12 Composite of August water vapor flux anomalies corresponding to the NCAP anomalies, its difference and regressing against negative NAT. (a) The composite of the vertically integrated whole water vapor flux anomalies in August during the period when the NCAP is in positive phase over decadal timescales. (b) As in (a), but for the period when the NCAP is in negative phase. (c) As in (a), but for the composite difference between (a) and (b). (d) The regression pattern of the vertically integrated whole layer water vapor flux anomalies over north China and the surrounding region onto the negative NAT over decadal timescales for 1979–2021.

Fig.13 Observed and modeled NCAP. (a) The red and blue lines are the observed and modeled detrended NCAP over decadal timescales for the period 1979–2021, respectively. The shaded areas indicate the 2-sigma uncertainty range of the modeled NCAP. (b) As in (a), but with the multidecadal trend included.

Fig.14 Observed, modeled and hindcasted NCAP. (a) The red, blue and black lines are the observed, modeled and hindcasted detrended NCAP over decadal timescales, covering the period of 1979–2021, 1979–2016 and 2017–2021, respectively. The shaded areas indicate the 2-sigma uncertainty range for the modeled and hindcasted NCAP, respectively. (b) As in (a), but with the multidecadal trend included.

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