The role of Rossby wave breakings in the climate variability at midlatitudes

• Main Author: Michel, Clio
• Other Authors: Toulouse, INPT, Rivière, Gwendal, Terray, Laurent
• Format: Thesis
• Language: French
• Published: 2012
• Subjects: Météorologie dynamique; Déferlements d'ondes de Rossby; Régimes de temps; Blocage; Rail des dépressions; Fronts de SST; Dynamic meteorology; Rossby wvave breaking; Weather regimes; Blocking; Storm track; SST fronts; envir; geo; Greenland; North Atlantic
• Online Access: http://www.theses.fr/2012INPT0091/document

This thesis aims at analyzing the dynamics of the interaction between baroclinic waves (stormtrack) and the atmospheric low-frequency variability at midlatitudes. Two different approaches have been followed to study the impact of baroclinic wave breakings on jet-streams, one using reanalysis data and the other numerical simulations of a climate model. The first part of the PhD dealt with the link between Rossby wave breakings and the four weather regimes over the North Atlantic in winter using ERA40 reanalysis. The calculation of wave breaking frequencies showed that wave breakings tend to reinforce weather regimes except the Scandinavian blocking which is destroyed by cyclonic wave breaking south of Greenland. Then, precursors of weather regime transitions have been identified. The first precursor is linked to the linear propagation of low-frequency anomalies (period greater than ten days). This is not a systematic precursor but it occurs during the zonal to blocking transition about one week before this latter and is related to a quasi-stationary wave train excited by convective anomalies in the North Atlantic subtropics. The systematic second precursor is related to non-linear transient eddy interactions and has been linked to Rossby wave breakings. The link between the surface cyclones, Rossby wave breakings and the formation and decay of the Scandinavian blocking has been more precisely studied through the preferential transitions from the zonal weather regime to the blocking and from the blocking to the Greenland anticyclone. During the formation and decay of the blocking, surface cyclones reach the same intensities but do not follow the same trajectories. During the blocking formation, surface cyclones follow straight trajectories toward the north of Scandinavia and are linked to an anticyclonic wave breaking. Whereas during the blocking decay, surface cyclones trajectories are curved over the North Atlantic toward Greenland and are linked to a cyclonic wave breaking favouring the Greenland anticyclone ...