Galactic Cosmic Rays and Low Clouds: Possible Reasons for Correlation Reversal
Influence of galactic cosmic rays (GCRs) on cloud formation is suggested to be an important part of the mechanism of solar activity influence on weather and climate. A high positive correlation between low cloud amount and GCR fluxes was observed in the 1980s–1990s; however, in the early 2000s, it w...
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| Format: | Book Part |
| Language: | English |
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IntechOpen
2018
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| Online Access: | https://openresearchlibrary.org/viewer/6e4084a0-7ab4-413c-949c-65b899966082 https://openresearchlibrary.org/ext/api/media/6e4084a0-7ab4-413c-949c-65b899966082/assets/external_content.pdf https://doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.75428 |
| Summary: | Influence of galactic cosmic rays (GCRs) on cloud formation is suggested to be an important part of the mechanism of solar activity influence on weather and climate. A high positive correlation between low cloud amount and GCR fluxes was observed in the 1980s–1990s; however, in the early 2000s, it was violated. In this work, we consider a nature of long-term correlation links between cloud cover at middle latitudes and GCRs, as well as possible reasons for this correlation reversal. It was shown that the GCR-cloud links observed on the decadal time scale are indirect and caused by GCR effects on cyclonic activity which depend on epochs of the large-scale atmospheric circulation. The reversal of GCR-cloud correlation in the 2000s seems to be due to a sharp weakening of the Arctic and Antarctic stratospheric polar vortices, which results in the change of the troposphere-stratosphere coupling and, then, of GCR contribution to the development of extratropical cyclogenesis. |
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