Monsoon

About: Monsoon is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 16087 publications have been published within this topic receiving 599888 citations.

On the observed variability of monsoon droughts over India

Abstract: In the present study, the observed variability of monsoon droughts over India has been examined using a drought monitoring index, namely the Standardized Precipitation Evapo-transpiration Index (SPEI). For calculating the SPEI over different time periods, long term (1901–2010), high resolution, monthly gridded temperature and rainfall data sets have been used. The drought time series shows significant interannual, decadal and long term trends. The analysis suggests a general increase in the intensity and percent area affected by moderate droughts during the recent decades. In particular, the frequency of multi-year (24 months) droughts has shown a statistically significant increase, which is attributed to increase in surface air temperatures and thus drying of the atmosphere. The wavelet analysis of SPEI suggests significant spectral peaks at quasi-biennial (2–3 years), ENSO (5–7 years) and decadal (10–16 years) time scales, with significant multi-decadal variations. The variability of monsoon droughts over India is significantly influenced by the tropical sea surface temperature anomalies. The Canonical correlation analysis (CCA) suggests that the major portion of the drought variability is influenced by the El Nino/Southern Oscillation (ENSO). Global warming, especially the warming of the equatorial Indian Ocean represents the second coupled mode and is responsible for the observed increase in intensity of droughts during the recent decades.

Coupled climate simulation of the evolution of global monsoons in the Holocene

Abstract: Evolution of global monsoons in the Holocene is simulated in a coupled climate model—the Fast Ocean Atmosphere Model—and is also compared with the simulations in another coupled climate model—the NCAR Climate System Model. Holocene climates are simulated under the insolation forcing at 3000, 6000, 8000, and 11 000 years before present. The evolution of six major regional summer monsoons is investigated: the Asian monsoon, the North African monsoon, the North American monsoon, the Australian monsoon, the South American monsoon, and the South African monsoon. Special attention has been paid to the relative roles of the direct insolation forcing and oceanic feedback. It is found that the responses of the monsoons to the insolation forcing and oceanic feedback differ substantially among regions, because of regional features of atmospheric and oceanic circulation and ocean–atmosphere interaction. In the Northern Hemisphere, the coupled models show a significant enhancement of all of the monsoons in th...

The Role of Intraseasonal Variability in the Nature of Asian Monsoon Precipitation

Abstract: The structure of the mean precipitation of the south Asian monsoon is spatially complex. Embedded in a broad precipitation maximum extending eastward from 70°E to the northwest tropical Pacific Ocean are strong local maxima to the west of the Western Ghats mountain range of India, in Cambodia extending into the eastern China Sea, and over the eastern tropical Indian Ocean and the Bay of Bengal (BoB), where the strongest large-scale global maximum in precipitation is located. In general, the maximum precipitation occurs over the oceans and not over the land regions. Distinct temporal variability also exists with time scales ranging from days to decades. Neither the spatial nor temporal variability of the monsoon can be explained simply as the response to the cross-equatorial pressure gradient force between the continental regions of Asia and the oceans of the Southern Hemisphere, as suggested in classical descriptions of the monsoon. Monthly (1979–2005) and daily (1997–present) rainfall estimates ...

Coherent Intraseasonal Oscillations of Ocean and Atmosphere during the Asian Summer Monsoon

Abstract: The space-time evolution of the ocean and atmosphere associated with 1998-2000 monsoon intraseasonal oscillations (ISO) in the Indian Ocean and west Pacific is studied using validated sea surface temperature (SST) and surface wind speed from the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) Microwave Imager, and satellite outgoing longwave radiation. Monsoon ISO consist of alternating episodes of active and suppressed atmospheric convection moving northward in the eastern Indian Ocean and the South China Sea. Negative/positive SST anomalies generated by fluctuations of net heat flux at the ocean surface move northward following regions of active/suppressed convection. Such coherent evolution of SST, surface heat flux and convection suggests that air-sea interaction might be important in monsoon ISO.

The Progresses of Recent Studies on the Variabilities of the East Asian Monsoon and Their Causes

Abstract: The variabilities of the East Asian summer monsoon arc an important research issue in China, Japan, and Korea. in this paper, progresses of recent studies on the intrascasonal, interannual, and interdecadal variations of the East Asian monsoon, especially the East Asian summer monsoon, and their causes are reviewed. Particularly, studies on the effects of the ENSO cycle, the western Pacific warm pool, the Tibetan Plateau and land surface processes on the variations of the East Asian summer monsoon are systematically reviewed.