Unstable Tropical Air-Sea Interaction Waves and Their Physical Mechanisms

In this paper, the tropical air-sea interaction is discussed by using a simple air-sea coupled model, in which the inertia-gravity waves are filtered off and only the equatorial Rossby waves are reserved in both the atmosphere and the ocean. There exist two kinds of air-sea interaction waves in the coupled model, that is, the high-frequency fast waves and the low-frequency slow waves. The phase speed of the fast waves is westward and the frequencies are close to those of the equatorial Rossby waves in the atmosphere. The slow waves propagate westward in the part of short wavelengths and eastward in that of long wavelengths. There exist instabilities for both the westward and eastward propagating slow waves. If the fast waves are filtered off, there is little effect on the slow waves which have great influence on the long range process in the tropical air-sea coupled system. According to the tropical air-sea interaction waves we obtain here, a possible explanation to the propagating process of ENSO events is given.

NUMERICAL EXPERIMENTS ON THE TROPICAL AIR-SEA INTERACTION WAVES

By means of the numerical method,the tropical air-sea interaction waves are studied.The results show that when the Kelvin waves are filtered out and only the equatorial Rossby waves are reserved both in the atmosphere and in the ocean,the disturbances can also propagate eastward because of the air-sea interaction.The critical wavelength of the eastward propagating waves is related to the intensity of the air-sea interaction.The stronger the air-sea interaction,the larger the eastward propagating components of the air-sea interaction waves.The results of the numerical experiments are in good agreement with those of the theoretical analysis(Chao and Zhang,1988).

Contrasts of bimodal tropical instability waves(TIWs)-induced wind stress perturbations in the Pacific Ocean among observations,ocean models,and coupled climate models

The coupling between wind stress perturbations and sea surface temperature(SST)perturbations induced by tropical instability waves(TIWs)in the Pacific Ocean has been revealed previously and proven crucial to both the atmosphere and ocean.However,an overlooked fact by previous studies is that the loosely defined“TIWs”actually consist of two modes,including the Yanai wave-based TIW on the equator(hereafter eTIW)and the Rossby wave-based TIW off the equator(hereafter vTIW).Hence,the individual feedbacks of the wind stress to the bimodal TIWs remain unexplored.In this study,individual coupling relationships are established for both eTIW and v TIW,including the relationship between the TIW-induced SST perturbations and two components of wind stress perturbations,and the relationship between the TIW-induced wind stress perturbation divergence(curl)and the downwind(crosswind)TIW-induced SST gradients.Results show that,due to different distributions of eTIW and vTIW,the coupling strength induced by the eTIW is stronger on the equator,and that by the vTIW is stronger off the equator.The results of any of eTIW and vTIW are higher than those of the loosely defined TIWs.We further investigated how well the coupling relationships remained in several widely recognized oceanic general circulation models and fully coupled climate models.However,the coupling relationships cannot be well represented in most numerical models.Finally,we confirmed that higher resolution usually corresponds to more accurate simulation.Therefore,the coupling models established in this study are complementary to previous research and can be used to refine the oceanic and coupled climate models.

Examination of wind-wave interaction source term in WAVEWATCH Ⅲ with tropical cyclone wind forcing

Results of drag coefficient（CD） from field observations and laboratory wave tank experiments indicate that the operational wave model can overestimate wind energy input under high wind conditions. The wind-wave interaction source term in WAVEWATCH Ⅲ has been modified to examine its behavior with tropical cyclone wind forcing. Using high resolution wind input,numerical experiments under idealized wind field and tropical cyclone Bonnie（1998） were designed to evaluate performance of the modified models. Both experiments indicate that the modified models with reduced CD significantly decrease wind energy input into the wave model and then simulate lower significant wave height（SWH） than the original model. However,the effects on spatial distribution of SWH,mean wavelength,mean wave direction,and directional wave spectra are insignificant. Due to the reduced wind energy input,the idealized experiment shows that the modified models simulate lower SWH than the original model in all four quadrants. The decrease in the front quadrants is significantly larger than that in the rear quadrants;it is larger under higher winds than lower winds. The realistic experiment on tropical cyclone Bonnie shows that the modified model with the various downward trends of CD in high winds creates a simulation that agrees best with scanning radar altimeter observations.

IMPACT OF AIR-SEA INTERACTION ON THE GENESIS OF TROPICAL INCIPIENT VORTEX OVER SOUTH CHINA SEA： A CASE STUDY

Based on 6-hourly sensible heat flux and latent heat flux from the NCEP Climate Forecast System Reanalysis(CFSR) and circulation data from the Japanese 25-year Reanalysis(JRA-25),the initial developing process of tropical cyclone Mindulle(1005) in 2010 has been diagnosed to reveal the impact of air-sea interaction over the South China Sea(SCS) on the genesis of its incipient vortex.The results show that the incipient vortex first occurred east of the Luzon Island on 0000 UTC 20 August,suggesting that the topographic forcing of the Luzon Island for easterly winds over the western Pacific might be one of the factors responsible for the formation of the incipient vortex.During the formation stage of the incipient vortex,strong southeasterlies over the SCS caused warm water of the middle and eastern SCS to flow toward the Luzon Island due to Ekman transport resulting from wind stress,leading to an increase of the sea surface temperature and sensible heat flux into the atmosphere.Although the anomalous sensible heating favored surface pressure to reduce,it was not conducive to the increase of local vorticity associated with the vortex above the heating area because,according to the atmospheric thermal adaptation theory,the anticyclonic vorticity would be created in the lower troposphere due to the decreased vertical gradient of the sensible heating.However,the ascending motions occurred over the eastern area of the anomalous sensible heating due to the augmentation of the vorticity advection with increasing height,causing water vapor to condense in the middle and upper troposphere.In turn,cyclonic vorticity was generated in the lower troposphere due to the increased vertical gradient of the condensation latent heating,resulting in the formation and further growth of the incipient vortex.Therefore,the vorticity creation due to the condensation heating played a dominant role during the subsequent enhancing stage of the incipient vortex.

RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN DIFFERENT TROPICAL CONVECTIVE ACTIVITIES AND LOW FREQUENCY WAVE－MEAN FLOW INTERACTIONS

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Impact of Surface Sensible Heating over the Tibetan Plateau on the Western Pacific Subtropical High: A Land–Air–Sea Interaction Perspective

The impact of surface sensible heating over the Tibetan Plateau （SHTP） on the western Pacific subtropical high （WPSH） with and without air-sea interaction was investigated in this study. Data analysis indicated that SHTP acts as a relatively independent factor in modulating the WPSH anomaly compared with ENSO events. Stronger spring SHTP is usually fol- lowed by an enhanced and westward extension of the WPSH in summer, and vice versa. Numerical experiments using both an AGCM and a CGCM confirmed that SHTP influences the large-scale circulation anomaly over the Pacific, which features a barotropic anticyclonic response over the northwestern Pacific and a cyclonic response to the south. Owing to different background circulation in spring and summer, such a response facilitates a subdued WPSH in spring but an en- hanced WPSH in summer. Moreover, the CGCM results showed that the equatorial low-level westerly at the south edge of the cyclonic anomaly brings about a warm SST anomaly （SSTA） in the equatorial central Pacific via surface warm advection. Subsequently, an atmospheric Rossby wave is stimulated to the northwest of the warm SSTA, which in turn enhances the at- mospheric dipole anomalies over the western Pacific. Therefore, the air-sea feedbacks involved tend to reinforce the effect of SHTP on the WPSH anomaly, and the role of SHTP on general circulation needs to be considered in a land-air-sea interaction framework.

A study on dynamical features of air-sea coupling waves in the tropics

The dynamical features of air-sea coupling waves and their stabilities in a simple coupled air-sea model in the tropics have been studied with respect to interaction occurring among different types of the free waves in the o-cean and in the atmosphere. It is pointed out that there exist a stable and an unstable air-sea interaction modes in the tropical coupled system , respectively. The propagation of the unstable mode relies greatly on the zonal space scale, i. e. only for wave length ranging from 5 000 km to 10 000 km can the disturbance unstably move slowly eastward. The waves that slowly propagate unstably eastward agree well with the observational facts. Finally,it is also proposed that the interaction between Kelvin wave in one medium and Rossby wave in another medium is a necessary condition for the occurrence of destabilization of the coupled air-sea system in the tropics.

Simulating Tropical Instability Waves in the Equatorial Eastern Pacific with a Coupled General Circulation Model

Satellite observations of SSTs have revealed the existence of unstable waves in the equatorial eastern Pacific and Atlantic oceans. These waves have a 20-40-day periodicity with westward phase speeds of 0.4-0.6 m s^-1 and wavelengths of 1000-2000 km during boreal summer and fall. They are generally called tropical instability waves （TIWs）. This study investigates TIWs simulated by a high-resolution coupled atmosphere-ocean general circulation model （AOGCM）. The horizontal resolution of the model is 120 km in the atmosphere, and 30 km longitude by 20 km latitude in the ocean. Model simulations show good agreement with the observed main features associated with TIWs. The results of energetics analysis reveal that barotropic energy conversion is responsible for providing the main energy source for TIWs by extracting energy from the meridional shear of the climatological-mean equatorial currents in the mixed layer. This deeper and northward-extended wave activity appears to gain its energy through baroclinic conversion via buoyancy work, which further contributes to the asymmetric distribution of TIWs. It is estimated that the strong cooling effect induced by equatorial upwelling is partially （-30%-40%） offset by the equatorward heat flux due to TIWs in the eastern tropical Pacific during the seasons when TIWs are active. The atmospheric mixed layer just above the sea surface responds to the waves with enhanced or reduced vertical mixing. Furthermore, the changes in turbulent mixing feed back to sea surface evaporation, favoring the westward propagation of TIWs. The atmosphere to the south of the Equator also responds to TIWs in a similar way, although TIWs are much weaker south of the Equator.

Impact of the Spring SST Gradient between the Tropical Indian Ocean and Western Pacific on Landfalling Tropical Cyclone Frequency in China

The present study identifies a significant influence of the sea surface temperature gradient（SSTG） between the tropical Indian Ocean（TIO; 15°S-15°N, 40°-90°E） and the western Pacific warm pool（WWP; 0°-15°N, 125°-155°E） in boreal spring on tropical cyclone（TC） landfall frequency in China's Mainland in boreal summer. During the period 1979-2015, a positive spring SSTG induces a zonal inter-basin circulation anomaly with lower-level convergence, mid-tropospheric ascendance and upper-level divergence over the west-central TIO, and the opposite situation over the WWP, which produces lower-level anomalous easterlies and upper-level anomalous westerlies between the TIO and WWP. This zonal circulation anomaly further warms the west-central TIO by driving warm water westward and cools the WWP by inducing local upwelling, which facilitates the persistence of the anomaly until the summer. Consequently, lower-level negative vorticity, strong vertical wind shear and lower-level anticyclonic anomalies prevail over most of the western North Pacific（WNP）, which decreases the TC genesis frequency. Meanwhile, there is an anomalous mid-tropospheric anticyclone over the main WNP TC genesis region,meaning a westerly anomaly dominates over coastal regions of China's Mainland, which is unfavorable for steering TCs to make landfall in China's Mainland during summer. This implies that the spring SSTG may act as a potential indicator for TC landfall frequency in China's Mainland.

Association between Tropical Convection and Boreal Wintertime Extratropical Circulation in 1982/83 and 1988/89

Boreal wintertime extratropical circulation is studied in relation to the tropical convection during the 1982/83 El Niño and 1988/89 La Niña. The anomaly structure of 1982/83 and 1988/89 over the extratropics reveals remarkably different features as the longitudinal tropical forcing region changes. The Rossby wave source (Positive) shows the largest maximum over East Asia in both years due to the persistent heating from the western Pacific warm pool area. However, the sink term shows contrasting features over the subtropics and extratropics between the two years. In the El Niño year, enhanced tropical convection over the eastern Pacific produces the Rossby wave sink at 10°N and shifted eastward over the North Pacific, while in the La Niña year, the sink area is shifted westward over the North Pacific. The contrasting features between the two events in mean-eddy interaction appears especially over the downstream area of the East Asian Jet. The extension (retraction) of the meanflow eastward (westward) to the east (west) of the dateline is related with the effect of the westward (eastward) E-vector and the strengthening (weakening) of the negative anomalies of the barotropic growth of kinetic energy. Hence, almost opposite characteristics between the two events can explain the close relationship of tropical convection and the extratropical internal variability.

Effects of surface waves and sea spray on air–sea fluxes during the passage of Typhoon Hagupit

Air–sea exchange plays a vital role in the development and maintenance of tropical cyclones（TCs）. Although studies have suggested the dependence of air–sea fluxes on surface waves and sea spray, how these processes modify those fluxes under TC conditions have not been sufficiently investigated based on in-situ observations.Using continuous meteorological and surface wave data from a moored buoy in the northern South China Sea,this study examines the effects of surface waves and sea spray on air–sea fluxes during the passage of Typhoon Hagupit. The mooring was within about 40 km of the center of Hagupit. Surface waves could increase momentum flux to the ocean by about 15%, and sea spray enhanced both sensible and latent heat fluxes to the atmosphere,causing Hagupit to absorb 500 W/m^2 more heat flux from the ocean. These results have powerful implications for understanding TC–ocean interaction and improving TC intensity forecasting.

INTERACTION BETWEEN WAVES IN LOW-LATITUDE ATMOSPHERE AND TROPICAL LOW-FREQUENCY OSCILIATION

This paper is an attempt to reveal the dynamic mechanism of low-frequency oscillation (LFO) in tropical atmosphere. A two-level model on equatorial β-plane which includes the equation of water vapor evolution and the interaction between condensational latent heating due to convection and large-scale dynamic processes is devel- oped. The difference in both heating capacity and moisture evaporation between underlying land and ocean surfaces is also taken into consideration. Firstly, the eigenmode in this model is analysed to reveal the effect of convective heating on equatorial waves. It is found that with this heating, all the waves including Kelvin waves, Rossby waves, gravity waves and mixed Rossby-gravity waves, are slowed down, thus frequency differences between fast and slow waves are reduced. Therefore these waves are more likely to interact with each other, causing the perturbations to propagate eastward very slowly and producing LFO. The comparison between results of dry and moist model integration has confirmed the conclusion from dynamic analysis.

Impact of Surface Exchange Coefficients and Sea Surface Cooling on Tropical Cyclone Simulation

The surface flux exchange associated with the exchange coefficients and upper ocean conditions is essential to the development of tropical cyclones(TCs).Using the Weather Research and Forecasting(WRF)model,the present study has investigated the impact of exchange coefficients and ocean coupling during Super Typhoon Saomai(2006).Firstly,two experiments with different formula of roughness are conducted.The experiment with the Donelan formula for drag coefficient(C_(d))and ramped formula for enthalpy coefficient(C_(k))can simulate stronger intensity compared to other experiments due to the increased surface wind and enthalpy fluxes.That is because the new formulas allows for a smaller C_(d)and larger C_(k)in the high wind regime than the former formulas did.Moreover,two coupled simulations between WRF and a one-dimensional ocean model are conducted to examine the feedback of sea surface cooling to the TC.In the experiments with a horizontal uniform mixed layer depth of 70 m,the sea surface cooling is too weak to change the evolution of TC.While in the experiment with an input mixed layer calculated using the Hybrid Coordinate Ocean Model(HYCOM)data,the significant sea surface cooling induces obvious impact on TC intensity and structure.Under the negative feedback of sea surface cooling,the sensible and latent heat fluxes decreases,especially in the right part of Saomai(2006).The negative feedback with coupled ocean model plays a vital role in simulating the intensity and structure of TC.

REGIONAL DIFFERENCES OF TEMPORAL-SPATIAL CHARACTERISTICS OF AIR-SEA INTERACTIONS IN TROPICAL OCEANS

The singular value decomposition (SVD) of air-sea interaction in the tropical western,central, and eastern Pacific,and the tropical Atlantic and Indian Oceans has been conducted by using the NCEP/NCAR 40-year reanalysis 1000 hPa monthly wind field and COADS monthly sea surface temperature (SST).Comparisons of the results suggest that these areas can be divided into three types from the viewpoint of air-sea interaction:tropical central-eastern Pacific belongs to monistic type,in which ENSO is the sole important process;tropical western Pacific and Indian Oceans belong to dualistic type,in which in addition to ENSO.there should be an another important process;tropical Atlantic Ocean belongs to pluralistic type,in which the process is complicated and the ENSO cycle is not evident.

The Dynamics of ENSO Anomaly as Revealed in Ensemble Climate Simulations-Impact of Mean Stationary Wave

A series of climate ensemble experiments using the climate model from National Centers for Environmental Prediction (NCEP) were performed to exam impact of sea surface temperature (SST) on dynamics of El-Nino/South-crn Oscillation (ENSO).A specific question addressed in this paper is how important the mean stationary wave influences anomalous Rossby wave trains or teleconnection patterns as often observed during ENSO events.Evidences from those ensemble simulations argue that ENSO anomalies,especially over Pacific-North America (PNA) region,appear to be a result of modification for climatological mean stationary wave forced by persistent tropical SST anomalies Therefore,the role of SST forcing in maintaining climate basic state is emphasized.In this argument,the interaction between atmospheric internal dynamics and external forcing,such as SST is a key element to understand and ultimately predict ENSO.

Numerical Simulation of Changes in Tropical Cyclone Intensity Using a Coupled Air-Sea Model

A coupled air-sea model for tropical cyclones （TCs） is constructed by coupling the Pennsylvania State University/National Center for Atmospheric Research mesoscale model （MM5） with the Princeton Ocean Model.Four numerical simulations of tropical cyclone development have been conducted using different configurations of the coupled model on the f-plane.When coupled processes are excluded,a weak initial vortex spins up into a mature symmetric TC that strongly resembles those observed and simulated in prior research.The coupled model reproduces the reduction in sea temperature induced by the TC reasonably well,as well as changes in the minimum central pressure of the TC that result from negative atmosphere-ocean feedbacks.Asymmetric structures are successfully simulated under conditions of uniform environmental flow.The coupled ocean-atmosphere model is suitable for simulating air-sea interactions under TC conditions.The effects of the ocean on the track of the TC and changes in its intensity under uniform environmental flow are also investigated.TC intensity responds nonlinearly to sea surface temperature （SST）.The TC intensification rate becomes smaller once the SST exceeds a certain threshold.Oceanic stratification also influences TC intensity,with stronger stratification responsible for a larger decrease in intensity.The value of oceanic enthalpy is small when the ocean is weakly stratified and large when the ocean is strongly stratified,demonstrating that the oceanic influence on TC intensity results not only from SST distributions but also from stratification.Air-sea interaction has only a slight influence on TC movement in this model.

SIMULATION OF OCEAN RESPONSES TO AN IDEALIZED LANDFALLING TROPICAL CYCLONE USING A COUPLED ATMOSPHERE-WAVE-OCEAN MODELING SYSTEM

Oceanic responses to a hypothetical landfalling tropical cyclone(TC) are studied by using a coupled atmosphere-wave-ocean modeling system(CAWOMS). A set of experiments are conducted to compare the effects of atmosphere-wave-ocean interaction on ocean responses in coastal and deep waters. The results show that in a three-way coupled atmosphere-wave-ocean system, the resonse to a tropical cyclone is considerably different in coastal water and deep water. In a three-way coupled system, air-sea interactions tend to increase coastal storm surge, inundation, significant wave heights and ocean currents in shallow coastal areas as a result of waveenhanced air-sea heat and moisture fluxes. But the change is little in sea surface temperature and mixed-layer structure due to the well-mixed nature in the coastal zone. In contrast, in a three-way coupled system, air-sea interactions enhance sea surface cooling, increase mixed layer depth in deep waters largely due to the tendency of a wave-enhanced TC to induce strong mixing and entrainment in the upper ocean. A stronger TC also strengthens the surface currents and significant wave height in the offshore waters. The inclusion of waves in air-sea interactions fundamentally changes the dynamic and thermodynamic coupling between tropical cyclone and the underlying ocean. In the absence of TC-wave consideration, a negative feedback between the TC and the upper ocean mixed layer results in a weakening of the TC system and a cooling in the offshore upper ocean and therefore reduces coastal storm surge, flooding areas, significant wave height and ocean currents. Only in a TC-waveocean three-way coupled system, air-sea interaction may correspond to a stronger TC due to wave-induced airsea heat and moisture fluxes which compensate the effect of negative feedback between the TC and the upper ocean. In coastal waters, the negative feedback between the TC and the ocean mixed layer is fairly weak. Airsea interaction is dominated by the positive TC-wave feedback. As a result, air-sea interaction increases coastal storm surge, inundation, currents and significant wave height.

STUDY OF AIR-SEA INTERACTION UNDER TYPHOON AND ITS APPLICATION IN STI

To improve the forecast of typhoon intensity and meet the requirements of operational services on marine meteorology in Shanghai Meteorological Service of CMA, a few of important scientific research projects from national, Shanghai municipal government and CMA were undertaken by Shanghai Typhoon Institute in recent 10 years. Some field experiments for typhoon were carried out. The observational researches on physical process of air-sea interaction reveal some new facts about the turbulence energy transport in the atmospheric and ocean boundary layer under typhoon. Especially there is more understanding for multi-scale response mechanism of ocean and feedback effect of each other. The simulation and prediction of typhoon intensity in the coupled ocean-atmosphere model are improved due to better expression of drag coefficient on sea surface and the sea spray effect on momentum and heat transport. Furthermore, the operational wave models were established for global and northwest Pacific respectively. In particular, the sea wave and storm surge numerical prediction systems with very high resolution including complex physical processes, such as interaction of wave and current, developed over China coastal sea. Based on the numerical model outputs some useful risk indexes for ship voyage were formed and put into use in Shanghai Marine and Meteorological Center, such as wave steepness index, ratio index of swell and synchronism oscillation index et al. The numerical marine products are widely used in daily operational work and professional services recently.

赤道不稳定波对海气相互作用影响的数值模拟分析

赤道不稳定波（tropical instability waves）存在于热带东太平洋赤道附近,通常于每年的春末夏初出现,以约0.6 m/s速度向西传播,波周期为20-40天左右,波长约为1000-2000 km。本文利用一个全球高分辨率海气耦合模式对赤道不稳定波在赤道附近的热量输送进行分析,表明赤道不稳定波产生指向赤道的热通量,从而部分抵消了热带东太平洋地区由Ekman辐散和温度平流导致的强冷却效应,维持热带地区的热量平衡。其对赤道冷舌区的增暖作用可以消除和减弱气候模式中热带东太平洋地区的系统性冷偏差,能使冷舌的强度和分布得到合理的改善,对气候模式的改进和发展具有潜在贡献。赤道不稳定波还可以改变赤道海洋上空低层大气层结稳定度,导致近地层强的风场辐合辐散,并进一步影响大气混合层的温度、风场等气象要素。模拟分析结果还表明,赤道不稳定波对大气强迫产生二次响应,改变赤道上空逆温层的垂直位移和逆温强度。研究赤道不稳定波对热带海洋气候及其海气相互作用机理的理解具有重要意义。