Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory

About: Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory is a facility organization based out in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Climate model & Climate change. The organization has 525 authors who have published 2432 publications receiving 264545 citations. The organization is also known as: GFDL.

Tropospheric Ozone Assessment Report: A critical review of changes in the tropospheric ozone burden and budget from 1850 to 2100

Abstract: Our understanding of the processes that control the burden and budget of tropospheric ozone have changed dramatically over the last 60 years. Models are the key tools used to understand these changes and these underscore that there are many processes important in controlling the tropospheric ozone budget. In this critical review we assess our evolving understanding of these processes, both physical and chemical. We review model simulations from the IGAC Atmospheric Chemistry and Climate Model Intercomparison Project and Chemistry Climate Modelling Initiative (CCMI) to assess the changes in the tropospheric ozone burden and its budget from 1850-2010. Analysis of these data indicates that there has been significant growth in the ozone burden from 1850-2000 (~ 43±9%), but smaller growth between 1960-2000 (~16±10%) and that the models simulate burdens of ozone well within recent satellite estimates. The CCMI model ozone budgets indicate that the net chemical production of ozone in the troposphere plateaued in the 1990s and has not changed since then inspite of increases in the burden. There has been a shift in net ozone production in the troposphere being greatest in the Northern mid and high latitudes to the Northern tropics; driven by the regional evolution of precursor emissions. An analysis of the evolution of tropospheric ozone through the 21st century, as simulated by CMIP5 models, reveals a large source of uncertainty associated with models themselves (i.e. in the way that they simulate the chemical and physical processes that control tropospheric ozone). This structural uncertainty is greatest in the near term (two to three decades) but emissions scenarios dominate uncertainty in the longer-term (2050-2100) evolution of tropospheric ozone. This intrinsic model uncertainty prevents robust predictions of near-term changes in the tropospheric ozone burden, and we review how progress can be made to reduce this limitation.

Ocean Water Clarity and the Ocean General Circulation in a Coupled Climate Model

Abstract: Ocean water clarity affects the distribution of shortwave heating in the water column. In a one-dimensional time-mean sense, increased clarity would be expected to cool the surface and heat subsurface depths as shortwave radiation penetrates deeper into the water column. However, wind-driven upwelling, boundary currents, and the seasonal cycle of mixing can bring water heated at depth back to the surface. This warms the equator and cools the subtropics throughout the year while reducing the amplitude of the seasonal cycle of temperature in polar regions. This paper examines how these changes propagate through the climate system in a coupled model with an isopycnal ocean component focusing on the different impacts associated with removing shading from different regions. Increasing shortwave penetration along the equator causes warming to the south of the equator. Increasing it in the relatively clear gyres off the equator causes the Hadley cells to strengthen and the subtropical gyres to shift equ...

Annual cycles of phytoplankton biomass in the subarctic Atlantic and Pacific Ocean

Abstract: High-latitude phytoplankton blooms support productive fisheries and play an important role in oceanic uptake of atmospheric carbon dioxide. In the subarctic North Atlantic Ocean, blooms are a recurrent feature each year, while in the eastern subarctic Pacific only small changes in chlorophyll (Chl) are seen over the annual cycle. Here we show that when evaluated using phytoplankton carbon biomass (Cphyto) rather than Chl, an annual bloom in the North Pacific is evident and can even rival blooms observed in the North Atlantic. The annual increase in subarctic Pacific phytoplankton biomass is not readily observed in the Chl record because it is paralleled by light- and nutrient-driven decreases in cellular pigment levels (Cphyto:Chl). Specifically, photoacclimation and iron stress effects on Cphyto:Chl oppose the biomass increase, leading to only modest changes in bulk Chl. The magnitude of the photoacclimation effect is quantified using descriptors of the near-surface light environment and a photophysiological model. Iron stress effects are diagnosed from satellite chlorophyll fluorescence data. Lastly, we show that biomass accumulation in the Pacific is slower than that in the Atlantic but is closely tied to similar levels of seasonal nutrient uptake in both basins. Annual cycles of satellite-derived Chl and Cphyto are reproduced by in situ autonomous profiling floats. These results contradict the long-standing paradigm that environmental conditions prevent phytoplankton accumulation in the subarctic Northeast Pacific and suggest a greater seasonal decoupling between phytoplankton growth and losses than traditionally implied. Further, our results highlight the role of physiological processes in shaping bulk properties, such as Chl, and their interpretation in studies of ocean ecosystem dynamics and climate change.

On the Southern Ocean CO2 uptake and the role of the biological carbon pump in the 21st century

Abstract: We use a suite of eight ocean biogeochemical/ecological general circulation models from the Marine Ecosystem Model Intercomparison Project and Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 5 archives to explore the relative roles of changes in winds (positive trend of Southern Annular Mode, SAM) and in warming- and freshening-driven trends of upper ocean stratification in altering export production and CO2 uptake in the Southern Ocean at the end of the 21st century. The investigated models simulate a broad range of responses to climate change, with no agreement on a dominance of either the SAM or the warming signal south of 44°S. In the southernmost zone, i.e., south of 58°S, they concur on an increase of biological export production, while between 44 and 58°S the models lack consensus on the sign of change in export. Yet in both regions, the models show an enhanced CO2 uptake during spring and summer. This is due to a larger CO2(aq) drawdown by the same amount of summer export production at a higher Revelle factor at the end of the 21st century. This strongly increases the importance of the biological carbon pump in the entire Southern Ocean. In the temperate zone, between 30 and 44°S, all models show a predominance of the warming signal and a nutrient-driven reduction of export production. As a consequence, the share of the regions south of 44°S to the total uptake of the Southern Ocean south of 30°S is projected to increase at the end of the 21st century from 47 to 66% with a commensurable decrease to the north. Despite this major reorganization of the meridional distribution of the major regions of uptake, the total uptake increases largely in line with the rising atmospheric CO2. Simulations with the MITgcm-REcoM2 model show that this is mostly driven by the strong increase of atmospheric CO2, with the climate-driven changes of natural CO2 exchange offsetting that trend only to a limited degree (∼10%) and with negligible impact of climate effects on anthropogenic CO2 uptake when integrated over a full annual cycle south of 30°S.

Circulation sensitivity to tropopause height

Abstract: The possibility that the tropopause could be lower during an ice-age cooling leads to an examination of the general sensitivity of global circulations to the tropopause height by altering a constant stratospheric temperature Ts in calculations with a dry, global, multilevel, spectral, primitive equation model subject to a simple Newtonian heating function. In general, lowering the tropopause by increasing the stratospheric temperature causes the jet stream to move to lower latitudes and the eddies to become smaller. Near the standard state with Ts = 200 K, the jets relocate themselves equatorward by 2° in latitude for every 5 K increase in the stratospheric temperature. A double-jet system, with centers at 30° and 60° latitude, occurs when the equatorial tropopause drops to 500 mb (for Ts = 250 K), with the high-latitude component extending throughout the stratosphere. The eddy momentum flux mainly traverses poleward across the standard jet at 40°, in keeping with the predominantly equatorward pr...