Preface to the Special Issue on Changing Arctic Climate and Low/Mid-latitudes Connections

The Arctic climate system has changed rapidly during recent decades with a two-four times faster warming rate than the global average subject to the uncertainties of analysis datasets and approaches.These changes have apparently resulted in broader and sizeable impacts within the Arctic,in the low/mid-latitudes,and globally.The importance of these changes and impacts makes the Arctic stand out within the global climate systems,drawing great attention and interests from the climate research community,the general public,and the government sector.One of the persistent,leading-edge topics in climate stud-ies during recent decades has therefore been to improve understanding of the underlying driving mechanisms,evaluate socioe-conomic and ecological impacts,and enhance the ability of the prediction and projections of Arctic climate changes.

浙江沿海潜在区域地震海啸风险分析

采用COMCOT海啸模型建立三重网格模型模拟了2011年3月11日日本东北部9.0级地震引发的海啸发生、发展以及在我国东南沿海传播过程。震源附近浮标站以及浙江沿海的潮位站实测资料验证结果显示,大部分监测站首波到达时间和海啸波的计算值相差在15%以内,表明模型可较好的模拟海啸在计算域内的传播过程。研究表明日本南海海槽、冲绳海槽以及琉球海沟南部是影响浙江沿海主要的区域潜在震源,通过情景计算分别模拟3个潜在震源9.1级、8.0级和8.7级地震引发的海啸对浙江沿海的海啸风险,计算结果表明,海啸波产生后可在3~8h内传至浙江省沿岸,海啸波达1~3m,最大可达4m,此时浙江沿岸面临Ⅲ~Ⅳ级海啸风险,达到淹没至严重淹没等级。

TIDAL FEATURES IN THE CHINA SEAS AND THEIR ADJACENT SEA AREAS AS DERIVED FROM TOPEX/POSEIDON ALTIMETER DATA

Some important tidal features of 8 major tidal constituents ( M 2, S 2, K 1, O 1, P 1, Sa, N 2 and K 2 ) in the China Seas and their adjacent sea areas were obtained using six years’ TOPEX/POSEIDON altimeter data. The results showed that the obtained co tidal and co range charts for these major tidal constituents agreed well with those of previous researches using observational data from coastal tidal gauge stations and numerical models.

Extreme Cold Events from East Asia to North America in Winter 2020/21:Comparisons,Causes,and Future Implications

Three striking and impactful extreme cold weather events successively occurred across East Asia and North America during the mid-winter of 2020/21.These events open a new window to detect possible underlying physical processes.The analysis here indicates that the occurrences of the three events resulted from integrated effects of a concurrence of anomalous thermal conditions in three oceans and interactive Arctic-lower latitude atmospheric circulation processes,which were linked and influenced by one major sudden stratospheric warming(SSW).The North Atlantic warm blob initiated an increased poleward transient eddy heat flux,reducing the Barents-Kara seas sea ice over a warmed ocean and disrupting the stratospheric polar vortex(SPV)to induce the major SSW.The Rossby wave trains excited by the North Atlantic warm blob and the tropical Pacific La Nina interacted with the Arctic tropospheric circulation anomalies or the tropospheric polar vortex to provide dynamic settings,steering cold polar air outbreaks.The long memory of the retreated sea ice with the underlying warm ocean and the amplified tropospheric blocking highs from the midlatitudes to the Arctic intermittently fueled the increased transient eddy heat flux to sustain the SSW over a long time period.The displaced or split SPV centers associated with the SSW played crucial roles in substantially intensifying the tropospheric circulation anomalies and moving the jet stream to the far south to cause cold air outbreaks to a rarely observed extreme state.The results have significant implications for increasing prediction skill and improving policy decision making to enhance resilience in“One Health,One Future”.

A Storm Surge Intensity Classification Based on Extreme Water Level and Concomitant Wave Height

Storm surge is one of the predominant natural threats to coastal communities. Qingdao is located on the southern coast of the Shandong Peninsula in China. The storm surge disaster in Qingdao depends on various influencing factors such as the intensity, duration, and route of the passing typhoon, and thus a comprehensive understanding of natural coastal hazards is essential. In order to make up the defects of merely using the warning water level, this paper presents two statistical distribution models(Poisson Bi- variable Gumbel Logistic Distribution and Poisson Bi-variable Log-normal Distribution) to classify the intensity of storm surge. We emphasize the joint return period of typhoon-induced water levels and wave heights measured in the coastal area of Qingdao since 1949. The present study establishes a new criterion to classify the intensity grade of catastrophic storms using the typhoon surge estimated by the two models. A case study demonstrates that the new criterion is well defined in terms of probability concept, is easy to implement, and fits well the calculation of storm surge intensity. The procedures with the proposed statistical models would be useful for the disaster mitigation in other coastal areas influenced by typhoons.

Study of Dissolved Chlorofluorocarbons in Lake Washington

Measurements of three chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs): trichlorofluoromethane (CFC-11), dichlorodifluoromethane (CFC-12) and trichlorotrifluoroethane (CFC-113), along with methyl chloroform (CH 3CCl 3) and carbon tetrachloride (CCl 4) were made in water samples from Lake Washington, using Electron Capture-Gas Chromatography (EC-GC). The samples were collected in mid-autumn, a period when the lake’s upper layer undergoes rapid cooling. At the time of sampling, a strong vertical temperature gradient was present in the lake, with surface temperatures of ～14℃, and near bottom (50 meters) temperatures of ～8℃. The concentrations of dissolved CFC-12 and CFC-11 increased with depth, as expected from the higher solubilities of these gases at lower temperatures. Atmospheric measurements made at the sampling site at the time of the cruise, showed that CFC-11 and CFC-12 saturations in the near surface samples were 100 % and 106%, respectively. For the deepest sample (52 meters) CFC-11 and CFC-12 saturations were 102 % and 126 %. Because the surface layer of the lake responds to changes in atmospheric CFCs on a time scale of several weeks, the higher than equilibrium concentrations of CFC-12 observed at the time of sampling may reflect earlier episodes of elevated levels of atmospheric CFC-12 in this urban area. High concentrations of dissolved CFCs in runoff or industrial effluent might also lead to elevated CFC levels in the lake. The cold, deep water of Lake Washington is relatively isolated from the effects of surface gas exchange except during winter, and the supersaturations observed in the deep layer may reflect periods of elevated atmospheric CFC-12 levels from the previous winter season. These results were compared to summertime profiles of CFC-11 and CFC-12 made in 1994.

Study of Vertical Breakwater Reliability Based on Copulas

The reliability of a vertical breakwater is calculated using direct integration methods based on joint density functions.The horizontal and uplifting wave forces on the vertical breakwater can be well fitted by the lognormal and the Gumbel distributions,respectively.The joint distribution of the horizontal and uplifting wave forces is analyzed using different probabilistic distributions,including the bivariate logistic Gumbel distribution,the bivariate lognormal distribution,and three bivariate Archimedean copulas functions constructed with different marginal distributions simultaneously.We use the fully nested copulas to construct multivariate distributions taking into account related variables.Different goodness fitting tests are carried out to determine the best bivariate copula model for wave forces on a vertical breakwater.We show that a bivariate model constructed by Frank copula gives the best reliability analysis,using marginal distributions of Gumbel and lognormal to account for uplifting pressure and horizontal wave force on a vertical breakwater,respectively.The results show that failure probability of the vertical breakwater calculated by multivariate density function is comparable to those by the Joint Committee on Structural Safety methods.As copulas are suitable for constructing a bivariate or multivariate joint distribution,they have great potential in reliability analysis for other coastal structures.

Using a skillful statistical model to predict September sea ice covering Arctic shipping routes

The rapid decrease in Arctic sea ice cover and thickness not only has a linkage with extreme weather in the midlatitudes but also brings more opportunities for Arctic shipping routes and polar resource exploration,both of which motivate us to further understand causes of sea-ice variations and to obtain more accurate estimates of seaice cover in the future.Here,a novel data-driven method,the causal effect networks algorithm,is applied to identify the direct precursors of September sea-ice extent covering the Northern Sea Route and Transpolar Sea Route at different lead times so that statistical models can be constructed for sea-ice prediction.The whole study area was also divided into two parts:the northern region covered by multiyear ice and the southern region covered by seasonal ice.The forecast models of September sea-ice extent in the whole study area(TSIE)and southern region(SSIE)at lead times of 1–4 months can explain over 65%and 79%of the variances,respectively,but the forecast skill of sea-ice extent in the northern region(NSIE)is limited at a lead time of 1 month.At lead times of 1–4 months,local sea-ice concentration and sea-ice thickness have a larger influence on September TSIE and SSIE than other teleconnection factors.When the lead time is more than 4 months,the surface meridional wind anomaly from northern Europe in the preceding autumn or early winter is dominant for September TSIE variations but is comparable to thermodynamic factors for NSIE and SSIE.We suggest that this study provides a complementary approach for predicting regional sea ice and is helpful in evaluating and improving climate models.

Toward development of the 4Dvar data assimilation system in the Bering Sea:reconstruction of the mean dynamic ocean topography

The Bering Sea circulation is derived as a variational inverse of hydrographic profiles（ temperature and salinity） , atmospheric climatologies and historical observation of ocean curents. The important result of this study is estimate of the mean climatological sea surface height （SSH） that can be used as a reference for satellite altimetry sea level anomaly data in the Bering Sea region. Numerical experiments reveal that, when combined with satellite altimetry, the obtained reference SSH effectively constrains a realistic reconstruction of the Amukta Pass circulation.

Assessment of oxidative stress indices in a marine macro brown alga Padina tetrastromatica(Hauck) from comparable polluted coastal regions of the Arabian Sea,west coast of India

Oxidative stress and antioxidant defence systems were assessed in a marine brown alga Padina tetrastromatica, commonly occurring from the tropics. Lipid peroxidation （LPX） and H2O2 were measured as oxidative stress markers, and antioxidant defences were measured as catalase （CAT）, glutathione S-transferase （GST） and ascorbic acid （ASA）, in order to understand their dissimilarity with respect to pollution levels from selective locations along the central west coast of India. A significant increased levels of LPX, H2O2, CAT and GST were observed in samples from relatively polluted localities （Colaba and Karwar） when compared to less polluted locality （Anjuna）, while AsA concentration was higher in algal samples from worst polluted region of Colaba. Heavy metals such as Cd and Pb were also higher in the vicinity of polluted areas compared to reference area. Variation of oxidative stress indices in response to accumulation of heavy metals within P. tetrastromatica could be used as molecular biomarkers in assessment and monitoring environmental quality of ecologically sensitive marine habitats.

Virus-Host Interactions Drive Contrasting Bacterial Diel Dynamics in the Ocean

Marine organisms perform a sea of diel rhythmicity.Planktonic diel dynamics have been shown to be driven by light,energy resources,circadian rhythms,and the coordinated coupling of photoautotrophs and heterotrophic bacterioplankton.Here,we explore the diel fluctuation of viral production and decay and their impact on the total and active bacterial community in the coastal and open seawaters of the South China Sea.The results showed that the night-production diel pattern of lytic viral production was concurrent with the lower viral decay at night,contributing to the accumulation of the viral population size during the night for surface waters.The diel variations in bacterial activity,community composition,and diversity were found highly affected by viral dynamics.This was revealed by the finding that bacterial community diversity was positively correlated to lytic viral production in the euphotic zone of the open ocean but was negatively related to lysogenic viral production in the coastal ocean.Such distinct but contrasting correlations suggest that viral life strategies can not only contribute to diversifying bacterial community but also potentially piggyback their host to dominate bacterial community,suggesting the tightly synchronized depth-dependent and habitat-specific diel patterns of virus-host interactions.It further implies that viruses serve as an ecologically important driver of bacterial diel dynamics across the ocean,highlighting the viral roles in bacterial ecological and biogeochemical processes in the ocean.