Studies of Climate Variability Using General Circulation Models

• Main Authors: T. Matsuno, H. Kida, Masahide Kimoto
• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Subjects: Indian; Pacific; North Atlantic
• Online Access: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.534.3517; http://www.terrapub.co.jp/e-library/toyota/pdf/049.pdf

Abstract—Some studies on interannual to decadal climate variability using atmospheric and coupled ocean-atmosphere general circulation models (GCMs) developed at the Center for Climate System Research, University of Tokyo, are introduced. The AGCM has been used for numerical experiments to quantify the role of land-surface feedback in the interannual variability of the Indian Monsoon and remote impacts of sea surface temperature anomalies in the Indian and equatorial eastern Pacific Oceans on an anomalous East Asian summer monsoon. A coupled upper-ocean-atmosphere GCM has been used to investigate coupled interannual and decadal variability in the tropical Pacific and extratropical Pacific and Atlantic Oceans. The coupled model shows decadal, quasi-quadrennial, and quasi-biennial sea surface temperature variability in the Pacific basin. Active involvement of extratropical-subtropical winds and ocean heat content in the simulated decadal mode is conspicuous. The coupled GCM also exhibits a decadal ocean-atmosphere mode over the North Atlantic. An experiment using a coupled atmosphere-mixed-layer ocean model reveals that a positive feedback exists in the North Atlantic atmosphere-ocean system.