1. Spatial dependence of diurnal temperature range trends on precipitation from 1950 to 2004.
- Author
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Liming Zhou, Aiguo Dai, Yongjiu Dai, Vose, Russell S., Cheng-Zhi Zou, Yuhong Tian, and Haishan Chen
- Subjects
- *
GLOBAL temperature changes , *CLIMATE change , *CLIMATOLOGY , *GLOBAL warming , *RADIATIVE forcing ,TEMPERATURE & the environment - Abstract
This paper analyzes the spatial dependence of annual diurnal temperature range (DTR) trends from 1950–2004 on the annual climatology of three variables: precipitation, cloud cover, and leaf area index (LAI), by classifying the global land into various climatic regions based on the climatological annual precipitation. The regional average trends for annual minimum temperature ( T min) and DTR exhibit significant spatial correlations with the climatological values of these three variables, while such correlation for annual maximum temperature ( T max) is very weak. In general, the magnitude of the downward trend of DTR and the warming trend of T min decreases with increasing precipitation amount, cloud cover, and LAI, i.e., with stronger DTR decreasing trends over drier regions. Such spatial dependence of T min and DTR trends on the climatological precipitation possibly reflects large-scale effects of increased global greenhouse gases and aerosols (and associated changes in cloudiness, soil moisture, and water vapor) during the later half of the twentieth century. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 2009
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