TY - JOUR
T1 - Equatorial Pacific Warming Attenuated by SST Warming Patterns in the Tropical Atlantic and Indian Oceans
AU - Fosu, Boniface
AU - He, Jie
AU - Liguori, Giovanni
PY - 2020/9/28
Y1 - 2020/9/28
N2 - Most climate models project an enhanced mean sea surface temperature (SST) warming in the equatorial Pacific and Atlantic, and a zonal SST dipole in the Indian Ocean. The remote influences of these SST change patterns remain uncertain. To examine the extent to which the patterns of SST changes in the tropical Indian and Atlantic Oceans modulate the warming in the tropical Pacific Ocean, we compare nudging experiments with prescribed structured and uniform SST changes in the tropics outside the Pacific. We find that the warming patterns in the tropical Indian and Atlantic Oceans, respectively, drive a canonical La Niña-like and elongated equatorial cooling through the Bjerknes feedback, acting to attenuate the warming in the equatorial Pacific substantially. The different SST cooling responses emanate from subtle differences between the initial wind forcing driven by the two basins' SST change patterns. These results have significant implications for future climate change projections.
AB - Most climate models project an enhanced mean sea surface temperature (SST) warming in the equatorial Pacific and Atlantic, and a zonal SST dipole in the Indian Ocean. The remote influences of these SST change patterns remain uncertain. To examine the extent to which the patterns of SST changes in the tropical Indian and Atlantic Oceans modulate the warming in the tropical Pacific Ocean, we compare nudging experiments with prescribed structured and uniform SST changes in the tropics outside the Pacific. We find that the warming patterns in the tropical Indian and Atlantic Oceans, respectively, drive a canonical La Niña-like and elongated equatorial cooling through the Bjerknes feedback, acting to attenuate the warming in the equatorial Pacific substantially. The different SST cooling responses emanate from subtle differences between the initial wind forcing driven by the two basins' SST change patterns. These results have significant implications for future climate change projections.
KW - anthropogenic patterns of SST changes
KW - enhanced Pacific SST warming
KW - La Niña-like SST cooling
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85091488937&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1029/2020GL088231
DO - 10.1029/2020GL088231
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85091488937
VL - 47
JO - Geophysical Research Letters
JF - Geophysical Research Letters
SN - 0094-8276
IS - 18
M1 - e2020GL088231
ER -