INTERANNUAL VARIATION OF INDEX OF EAST ASIAN LAND-SEA THERMAL DIFFERENCE AND ITS RELATION TO MONSOON CIRCULATION AND RAINFALL OVER CHINA

This paper proposes an index of land-sea thermal difference(ILSTD)that describes its zonal and meridional strength responsible for East Asian monsoon circulation to study its relation to the East Asian monsoon circulation and the summer rainfall over China on an interannual basis.Results are as follows:(1)ILSTD can be used to measure the strength of East Asian summer monsoon in such a way that the strong(weak)ILSTD years are associated with strong(weak)summer monsoon circulation.(2)The index also reflects well summer rainfall anomaly over the eastern part of China. In the strong index years,rain belt is mainly located over the northern China,and serious drought emerges in the Jianghuai valleys and mid-lower reaches of the Changjiang River,along with increase of rainfall in North and South China,but in the weak years it is contrary.(3)Besides,the index has obvious QBO and quasi 4-year oscillations,but the periods and amplitudes have significant changes on an interdecadal basis.

MAINTAINABLE MECHANISM OF MESO-β SCALE CONVECTIVE SYSTEM

By means of the Penn State-NCAR Mesoscale Model Version 5(MM5)with a horizontal resolution of 20 km.the maintainable mechanism of Meso-β scale Convective System(Mβ CS)has been investigated on the basis of simulation of the temporal and spatial thermodynamics structure of the MβCS which occurred in Wuhan and its surroundings on 21 July 1998.The occurrence of the significant warm-core in the center of the MβCS happened in Changjiang River Basin between the Mufu Mountain and the Dabie Mountain.To the southern side of the MβCS,there exist the southwest low-level jet(LLJ)and the vertical secondary circulation in the low and middle troposphere respectively.In respect to the northern of the MβCS,the northwest jet emerges in the upper troposphere,accompanied with cold and dry atmosphere downdrafts,resulting in another secondary circulation.The foregoing mentioned vertical wind shear provides a favorable dynamical environment for the intensification and maintenance of the MβCS.Equally important,the latent heat release associated with the MβCS produces the warm center in the middle troposphere and the pressure falls.The pressure drop then accelerates air parcels toward the low leading to strong convergence as well as the intensified convection,establishing a positive feedback between the convection and the latent heat release,which is the thermodynamic mechanism of the development and maintenance of the MβCS.

NUMERICAL STUDY ON THE ROLE OF VORTICAL AND DIVERGENT COMPONENTS OF WIND STRESS IN ENSO CYCLE

The 1960-1991 monthly mean FSU (Florida State University)wind stress data are decomposed into a vortical and a divergent component with each of which to force the model ocean in the context of a two-layer tropical Pacific model.Evidence suggests that for the seasonal variation the ocean forcing does not produce a realistic cold tongue using either of the components and the tongue will not be effectively improved in its intensity and pattern even if the components are doubled or halved:the utilization of climatic mean wind stress(no decomposition is done of the wind stress)that contains its seasonal variation will lead to a realistic SST distribution on which is imposed,separately,the interannual anomalies of each of the components so as to get the SSTA pattern:under the action of the interannual anomaly of the vortical(divergent)component there arises qnite intense SSTA oscillation marked by noticeable ENSO periods(feeble SSTA with higher oscillation frequency for obscure ENSO periods),thereby illustrating that the roles of the two components differ from each other in the genesis of SST variation on a seasonal and an interannual basis such that a realistic cold tongue pattern follows under the joint effects on the model ocean of the two components of wind stress while rational E1 Nino/La Nina phenomena result under the forcing of an anomalous wind stress vortical component.Moreover,the divergent component is innegligible in generating a mean climatic condition of the ocean sector but of less importance compared to the vortical component in ENSO development.