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All IPCC definitions taken from Climate Change 2007: The Physical Science Basis. Working Group I Contribution to the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Annex I, Glossary, pp. 941-954. Cambridge University Press.

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New research, April 16-22, 2018

Posted on 27 April 2018 by Ari Jokimäki

A selection of new climate related research articles is shown below.

Climate change

Temperature, precipitation, wind

1. Time Scales and Sources of European Temperature Variability (open access)

"We find that eastern Europe is dominated by subdecadal SAT variability associated with the North Atlantic Oscillation, whereas interdecadal and multidecadal SAT variability over northern and southern Europe are thermodynamically driven by ocean temperature anomalies. Our results provide evidence that temperature anomalies in the North Atlantic Ocean are advected over land by the mean westerly winds and, hence, provide a mechanism through which ocean temperature controls the variability and provides predictability of European SAT."

2. A possible recovery of the near-surface wind speed in Eastern China during winter after 2000 and the potential causes

3. Mechanisms Controlling Global Mean Sea Surface Temperature Determined From a State Estimate

4. Uganda rainfall variability and prediction

5. An analysis of spatial representativeness of air temperature monitoring stations

6. Global temperature definition affects achievement of long-term climate goals (open access)

7. Concurrent increases in wet and dry extremes projected in Texas and combined effects on groundwater (open access)

Extreme events

8. Facing climate change-related extreme events in megacities of China in the context of 1.5 °C global warming

"These extreme events have shown an uptrend in China's megacities and are projected to further increase in the future. Notably, the projected intensity of extreme temperature and precipitation events in China's three urban agglomerations is lower under 1.5 °C global warming compared with 2 °C."

9. Global Changes in Drought Conditions Under Different Levels of Warming

"Results show that two thirds of global population will experience a progressive increase in drought conditions with warming. For drying areas, drought durations are projected to rise at rapidly increasing rates with warming, averaged globally from 2.0 month/°C below 1.5°C to 4.2 month/°C when approaching 3°C. Drought magnitudes could double for 30% of global landmass under stringent mitigation. If contemporary warming rates continue, water supply?demand deficits could become fivefold in size for most of Africa, Australia, southern Europe, southern and central states of the United States, Central America, the Caribbean, north?west China, and parts of Southern America."

10. Drought Indices, Drought Impacts, CO2, and Warming: a Historical and Geologic Perspective

11. Risk assessment of precipitation extremes in northern Xinjiang, China (open access)

12. Increased Frequency of Summer Extreme Heat Waves over Texas Area Tied to the Amplification of Pacific Zonal SST Gradient

13. Changing urban risk: 140 years of climatic hazards in New York City (open access)

14. Climate Change and Drought: the Soil Moisture Perspective

Forcings and feedbacks

15. The Response of the Ocean Thermal Skin Layer to Variations in Incident Infrared Radiation

"Ocean warming trends are observed and coincide with the increase in concentrations of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere resulting from human activities. At the ocean surface, most of the incoming infrared (IR) radiation is absorbed within the top micrometers of the ocean's surface where the thermal skin layer (TSL) exists. Thus, the incident IR radiation does not directly heat the upper few meters of the ocean. This paper investigates the physical mechanism between the absorption of IR radiation and its effect on heat transfer at the air?sea boundary. The hypothesis is that given the heat lost through the air?sea interface is controlled by the TSL, the TSL adjusts in response to variations in incident IR radiation to maintain the surface heat loss. This modulates the flow of heat from below and hence controls upper ocean heat content. This hypothesis is tested using the increase in incoming longwave radiation from clouds and analyzing vertical temperature profiles in the TSL retrieved from sea?surface emission spectra. The additional energy from the absorption of increasing IR radiation adjusts the curvature of the TSL such that the upward conduction of heat from the bulk of the ocean into the TSL is reduced. The additional energy absorbed within the TSL supports more of the surface heat loss. Thus, more heat beneath the TSL is retained leading to the observed increase in upper ocean heat content."

16. The influence of internal variability on Earth's energy balance framework and implications for estimating climate sensitivity (open access)

"One of the most important parameters in climate science is the equilibrium climate sensitivity (ECS). Estimates of this quantity based on 20th-century observations suggest low values of ECS (below 2 °C). We show that these calculations may be significantly in error. Together with other recent work on this problem, it seems probable that the ECS is larger than suggested by the 20th-century observations."

17. Insights into the diurnal cycle of global Earth outgoing radiation using a numerical weather prediction model (open access)

18. Toward Global Mapping of Methane With TROPOMI: First Results and Intersatellite Comparison to GOSAT (open access)

19. Trends and variability of cloud fraction cover in the Arctic, 1982–2009

20. Increased importance of methane reduction for a 1.5 degree target (open access)

21. Climatology and long-term evolution of ozone and carbon monoxide in the upper troposphere–lower stratosphere (UTLS) at northern midlatitudes, as seen by IAGOS from 1995 to 2013 (open access)

Cryosphere

22. Grounding line migration through the calving season at Jakobshavn Isbræ, Greenland, observed with terrestrial radar interferometry (open access)

23. A Century of Stability of Avannarleq and Kujalleq Glaciers, West Greenland, Explained Using High?Resolution Airborne Gravity and Other Data

24. Exploring the Potential Impact of Greenland Meltwater on Stratification, Photosynthetically Active Radiation, and Primary Production in the Labrador Sea

25. Seasonal and Interannual Variations of Sea Ice Mass Balance From the Central Arctic to the Greenland Sea

26. Subglacial drainage patterns of Devon Island, Canada: detailed comparison of rivers and subglacial meltwater channels (open access)

27. Evaluating Impacts of Recent Arctic Sea Ice Loss on the Northern Hemisphere Winter Climate Change

28. Changes in flow of Crosson and Dotson ice shelves, West Antarctica, in response to elevated melt (open access)

29. Modelling the climate and surface mass balance of polar ice sheets using RACMO2 – Part 2: Antarctica (1979–2016) (open access)

Hydrosphere

30. Bias in Estimates of Global Mean Sea Level Change Inferred from Satellite Altimetry

"We demonstrate that using satellite altimetry records to estimate global ocean volume changes can lead to biases that can exceed 15%. The level of bias will depend on the relative contributions to sea level changes from the Antarctic and Greenland Ice Sheets."

31. The response of vegetation to rising CO2 concentrations plays an important role in future changes in the hydrological cycle

32. The sign, magnitude and potential drivers of change in surface water extent in Canadian tundra (open access)

33. A dual model for emulation of thermosteric and dynamic sea-level change

34. Risks for the global freshwater system at 1.5 °C and 2 °C global warming (open access)

35. Observational evidence for the relationship between spring soil moisture and June rainfall over the Indian region

Atmospheric and oceanic circulation

36. The Effect of Arctic Freshwater Pathways on North Atlantic Convection and the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation

37. Relationship between El Niño–Southern Oscillation and the Symmetry of the Hadley Circulation: Role of the Sea Surface Temperature Annual Cycle

38. The Influence of ENSO Flavors on Western North Pacific Tropical Cyclone Activity

39. Multi-decadal timeseries of the Indonesian throughflow

40. Unprecedented 2015/2016 Indo?Pacific Heat Transfer Speeds Up Tropical Pacific Heat Recharge

41. Decadal variability of the meridional geostrophic transport in the upper tropical North Pacific Ocean

Carbon cycle

42. Hurricane Arthur and its effect on the short-term variability of pCO2 on the Scotian Shelf, NW Atlantic (open access)

43. Vascular plant?mediated controls on atmospheric carbon assimilation and peat carbon decomposition under climate change

44. Global effects of plant litter alterations on soil CO2 to the atmosphere

45. Interannual drivers of the seasonal cycle of CO2 in the Southern Ocean (open access)

Climate change impacts

Mankind

46. Climate-related displacements of coastal communities in the Arctic: Engaging traditional knowledge in adaptation strategies and policies

47. Sea Level Rise Impacts on Wastewater Treatment Systems Along the U.S. Coasts

48. The Effects of Social Connections on Evacuation Decision Making during Hurricane Irma

49. Climate security assessment of countries

50. Integration anxiety: The cognitive isolation of climate change

51. Global change effects on land management in the Mediterranean region

Biosphere

52. Ocean acidification changes the structure of an Antarctic coastal protistan community (open access)

"This study shows a shift in a natural Antarctic microbial community, with CO2 levels exceeding 634 μatm changing the community composition and favouring small cells. This would have significant flow effects for Antarctic food webs and elemental cycles."

53. Natural ocean acidification at Papagayo upwelling system (north Pacific Costa Rica): implications for reef development (open access)

"Local coral reefs are exposed to acidic and undersaturated waters in upwelling and non-upwelling events. These restrictive conditions occur alongside local stressors, potentially decreasing reefs' resilience and increasing their vulnerability under future OA."

54. Mass coral bleaching causes biotic homogenization of reef fish assemblages

55. Coral bleaching is linked to the capacity of the animal host to supply essential metals to the symbionts

56. Time lag and negative responses of forest greenness and tree growth to warming over circumboreal forests

57. The response of big sagebrush (Artemisia tridentata) to interannual climate variation changes across its range (open access)

58. Nitrous oxide emissions could reduce the blue carbon value of marshes on eutrophic estuaries (open access)

59. Balancing trade-offs between ecosystem services in Germany's forests under climate change (open access)

60. Hatching delays in great tits and blue tits in response to an extreme cold spell: a long-term study (open access)

61. Elevated CO2 did not affect the hydrological balance of a mature native Eucalyptus woodland

62. Is there a substitution of Pinaceae by Fagaceae in temperate forests at the global scale?

"Our results indicate a widespread increase in dominance of Fagaceae species at the expense of Pinaceae across northern temperate forests, with the exception of Eastern North America."

63. Plants and Drought in a Changing Climate

Climate change mitigation

64. Independent data for transparent monitoring of greenhouse gas emissions from the land use sector – What do stakeholders think and need? (open access)

65. Large uncertainty in carbon uptake potential of land?based climate?change mitigation efforts

66. Enhancing global climate policy ambition towards a 1.5 °C stabilization: a short-term multi-model assessment (open access)

Emission savings

67. Avoided economic impacts of energy demand changes by 1.5 and 2 °C climate stabilization (open access)

68. Global radiative effects of solid fuel cookstove aerosol emissions (open access)

69. Economic drivers of telecoupling and terrestrial carbon fluxes in the global soybean complex

70. CO2 abatement goals for international shipping (open access)

Energy production

71. Comparing future patterns of energy system change in 2?°C scenarios to expert projections

72. Emerging energy sources for electric vehicle charging station

73. How households adapted their energy use during the Zambian energy crisis

Other papers

General climate science

74. A Dynamically Consistent, Multi-Variable Ocean Climatology (open access)

Palaeoclimatology

75. Coral?Derived Western Pacific Tropical Sea Surface Temperatures During the Last Millennium

"Reconstructed coral Sr/Ca?sea surface temperatures indicate that the “Little Ice Age (1711–1817 CE)” period was ~0.7°C cooler than the “Medieval Climate Anomaly (913?1132 CE)” and that late 20th century warming of the western Pacific is likely unprecedented over the past millennium."

76. Farming data: Testing climatic and palaeoenvironmental effect on Neolithic Adriatic stockbreeding and hunting through zooarchaeological meta-analysis

77. Accumulation patterns around Dome C, East Antarctica, in the last 73?kyr (open access)

78. Ice Core Records of West Greenland Melt and Climate Forcing

79. An inverse approach to the course of the ‘Little Ice Age’ glacier advance and the following deglaciation at Austerdalsisen, eastern Svartisen, northern Norway

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  1. In a first-of-its-kind study, scientists have combined an array of NASA satellite observations of Earth with data on human activities to map locations where freshwater is changing around the globe and why.

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