The Influence of a Weakening of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation on ENSO

• Published in: Journal of Climate
• Main Authors: Timmermann, Axel, Okumura, Y., An, Soon-Il, Clement, Amy, Dong, B., Guilyardi, Éric, Hu, A., Jungclaus, J. H., Renold, M., Stocker, Thomas F., Stouffer, Ronald J., Sutton, Rowan, Xie, S.-P., Yin, J.
• Other Authors: International Pacific Research Center (IPRC), School of Ocean and Earth Science and Technology (SOEST), University of Hawai‘i Mānoa (UHM)-University of Hawai‘i Mānoa (UHM), Department of Atmospheric Sciences Seoul, Yonsei University, Division of Meteorology and Physical Oceanography Miami (MPO/RSMAS), Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science (RSMAS), University of Miami Coral Gables -University of Miami Coral Gables, Department of Meteorology Reading, University of Reading (UOR), Laboratoire d'Océanographie et du Climat : Expérimentations et Approches Numériques (LOCEAN), Muséum national d'Histoire naturelle (MNHN)-Institut de Recherche pour le Développement (IRD)-Université Pierre et Marie Curie - Paris 6 (UPMC)-Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Institut Pierre-Simon-Laplace (IPSL (FR_636)), École normale supérieure - Paris (ENS-PSL), Université Paris sciences et lettres (PSL)-Université Paris sciences et lettres (PSL)-Université de Versailles Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines (UVSQ)-Commissariat à l'énergie atomique et aux énergies alternatives (CEA)-Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)-Université Paris Diderot - Paris 7 (UPD7)-École polytechnique (X)-Centre National d'Études Spatiales Toulouse (CNES)-Sorbonne Université (SU)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-École normale supérieure - Paris (ENS-PSL), Université Paris sciences et lettres (PSL)-Université Paris sciences et lettres (PSL)-Université de Versailles Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines (UVSQ)-Commissariat à l'énergie atomique et aux énergies alternatives (CEA)-Université Paris Diderot - Paris 7 (UPD7)-École polytechnique (X)-Centre National d'Études Spatiales Toulouse (CNES)-Sorbonne Université (SU)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), National Center for Atmospheric Research Boulder (NCAR), Max Planck Institute for Meteorology (MPI-M), Max-Planck-Gesellschaft, Climate and Environmental Physics Bern (CEP), Physikalisches Institut Bern, Universität Bern Bern (UNIBE)-Universität Bern Bern (UNIBE), Dynamics laboratory, Princeton University, NOAA Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory (GFDL), National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: HAL CCSD 2007
• Subjects: [PHYS.PHYS.PHYS-GEO-PH]Physics [physics]/Physics [physics]/Geophysics [physics.geo-ph]; [SDU.STU.GP]Sciences of the Universe [physics]/Earth Sciences/Geophysics [physics.geo-ph]; [SDE.MCG]Environmental Sciences/Global Changes; Pacific; North Atlantic
• Online Access: https://hal.science/hal-00770724; https://hal.science/hal-00770724/document; https://hal.science/hal-00770724/file/%5B15200442%20-%20Journal%20of%20Climate%5D%20The%20Influence%20of%20a%20Weakening%20of%20the%20Atlantic%20Meridional%20Overturning%20Circulation%20on%20ENSO.pdf; https://doi.org/10.1175/JCLI4283.1

International audience The influences of a substantial weakening of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation (AMOC) on the tropical Pacific climate mean state, the annual cycle, and ENSO variability are studied using five different coupled general circulation models (CGCMs). In the CGCMs, a substantial weakening of the AMOC is induced by adding freshwater flux forcing in the northern North Atlantic. In response, the well-known surface temperature dipole in the low-latitude Atlantic is established, which reorganizes the large-scale tropical atmospheric circulation by increasing the northeasterly trade winds. This leads to a southward shift of the intertropical convergence zone (ITCZ) in the tropical Atlantic and also the eastern tropical Pacific. Because of evaporative fluxes, mixing, and changes in Ekman divergence, a meridional temperature anomaly is generated in the northeastern tropical Pacific, which leads to the development of a meridionally symmetric thermal background state. In four out of five CGCMs this leads to a substantial weakening of the annual cycle in the eastern equatorial Pacific and a subsequent intensification of ENSO variability due to nonlinear interactions. In one of the CGCM simulations, an ENSO intensification occurs as a result of a zonal mean thermocline shoaling.Analysis suggests that the atmospheric circulation changes forced by tropical Atlantic SSTs can easily influence the large-scale atmospheric circulation and hence tropical eastern Pacific climate. Furthermore, it is concluded that the existence of the present-day tropical Pacific cold tongue complex and the annual cycle in the eastern equatorial Pacific are partly controlled by the strength of the AMOC. The results may have important implications for the interpretation of global multidecadal variability and paleo-proxy data.