Impacts of Atlantic multidecadal variability on the tropical Pacific: a multi-model study

Ruprich-Robert, Y., Moreno-Chamarro, E., Levine, X., Bellucci, A., Cassou, C., Castruccio, F., Davini, P., Eade, R., Gastineau, G., Hermanson, L., Hodson, D. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7159-6700, Lohmann, K., Lopez-Parages, J., Monerie, P.-A. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5304-9559, Nicoli, D., Qasmi, S., Roberts, C. D., Sanchez-Gomez, E., Danabasoglu, G., Dunstone, N., Martin-Rey, M., Msadek, R., Robson, J. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3467-018X, Smith, D. and Tourigny, E. (2021) Impacts of Atlantic multidecadal variability on the tropical Pacific: a multi-model study. npj Climate and Atmospheric Science, 4 (1). 33. ISSN 2397-3722 doi: 10.1038/s41612-021-00188-5

Abstract/Summary

Atlantic multidecadal variability (AMV) has been linked to the observed slowdown of global warming over 1998-2012 through its impact on the tropical Pacific. Given the global importance of tropical Pacific variability, better understanding this Atlantic-Pacific teleconnection is key for improving climate predictions, but the robustness and strength of this link are uncertain. Analyzing a multi-model set of sensitivity experiments, we find that models differ by a factor of 10 in simulating the amplitude of the Equatorial Pacific cooling response to observed AMV warming. The inter-model spread is mainly driven by different amounts of moist static energy injection from the tropical Atlantic surface into the upper troposphere. We reduce this inter-model uncertainty by analytically correcting models for their mean precipitation biases and we quantify that, following an observed 0.26°C AMV warming, the equatorial Pacific cools by 0.11°C with an inter-model standard deviation of 0.03°C.

Item Type	Article
URI	https://reading-clone.eprints-hosting.org/id/eprint/98502
Identification Number/DOI	10.1038/s41612-021-00188-5
Refereed	Yes
Divisions	Science > School of Mathematical, Physical and Computational Sciences > NCAS Science > School of Mathematical, Physical and Computational Sciences > Department of Meteorology
Publisher	Nature Publishing Group
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