Strength and Sensitivity of Land-Atmosphere Interaction

Fuente: arXiv
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1. Verfasser: Yin, Jun
Format: Preprint
Veröffentlicht: 2024
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author Yin, Jun
author_facet Yin, Jun
contents The land-atmosphere coupling strength has been defined as the percentage of precipitation variability explained by the variation of soil moisture in the Global Land-Atmosphere Coupling Experiment (GLACE). While it is useful to identify global hotspots of land-atmosphere interaction, this coupling strength is different from coupling sensitivity, which directly quantifies how precipitation generation responds to the perturbation of soil moisture and is essential for our understanding of the global water cycle. To disentangle these two quantities, here we theoretically explore the relationships among coupling strength, sensitivity, and soil moisture variances. We use climate model outputs to show that the largest soil moisture variances are located in the transitional climate zones and the variations of soil moisture largely account for the geographical patterns of coupling hotspots. The coupling sensitivity is not necessarily low in non-hotspot regions, which could impose great impacts on the development of extreme climate events. We therefore call for more research attention on coupling sensitivity to improve our understanding of the climate system.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2405_01287
institution arXiv
publishDate 2024
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Strength and Sensitivity of Land-Atmosphere Interaction
Yin, Jun
Atmospheric and Oceanic Physics
Geophysics
The land-atmosphere coupling strength has been defined as the percentage of precipitation variability explained by the variation of soil moisture in the Global Land-Atmosphere Coupling Experiment (GLACE). While it is useful to identify global hotspots of land-atmosphere interaction, this coupling strength is different from coupling sensitivity, which directly quantifies how precipitation generation responds to the perturbation of soil moisture and is essential for our understanding of the global water cycle. To disentangle these two quantities, here we theoretically explore the relationships among coupling strength, sensitivity, and soil moisture variances. We use climate model outputs to show that the largest soil moisture variances are located in the transitional climate zones and the variations of soil moisture largely account for the geographical patterns of coupling hotspots. The coupling sensitivity is not necessarily low in non-hotspot regions, which could impose great impacts on the development of extreme climate events. We therefore call for more research attention on coupling sensitivity to improve our understanding of the climate system.
title Strength and Sensitivity of Land-Atmosphere Interaction
topic Atmospheric and Oceanic Physics
Geophysics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2405.01287