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Any skillful prediction is of great benefit to North China, a region that is densely populated and greatly impacted by droughts. This paper reports potential predictability of North China summer drought 1 month ahead based on hindcasts for 1961–2005 from the "ENSEMBLES" project. Correlation scores of the standardized precipitation–evapotranspiration index and standardized precipitation index reach 0.49 and 0.39, respectively. The lower-level northwestern Pacific cyclonic circulation anomaly (NWPCCA) and East Asian upper-tropospheric temperature (UTT) cooling are the crucial circulations with regard to summer drought. Two sources of predictability are identified: 1) Pacific–Japan and Silk Road teleconnections forced by well-established eastern Pacific Ocean El Niño sea surface temperature anomalies (SSTA) in summer, when the two key circulations are both well predicted because of a good prediction of enhanced equatorial central Pacific (CP) rainfall and Indian rainfall deficit, and 2) the subtropical atmosphere–ocean coupling associated with CP El Niño developing, when the skill mainly arises from the reasonable prediction of NWPCCA. In observations, the NWPCCA persists from the preceding spring to summer through a wind–evaporation–SST feedback related to the Pacific meridional mode (PMM). In predictions, the persistence of the NWPCCA is mainly forced by the enhanced convection over the subtropical central North Pacific due to the persistence of the PMM-related meridional SSTA gradient over the CP. This predicted SSTA suppresses the equatorial Pacific rainfall, contributing to low prediction skill for the East Asian UTT cooling. This study demonstrates the importance of extratropical signals from the preceding season in North China summer drought prediction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Previous studies detected significant negative correlations between the nonuniform land surface warming and the decadal weakened activities of the summer extratropical cyclones (ECs) over East Asia and the East Asian summer monsoon (EASM) after the early 1990s. Here such relationships are further examined and the possible mechanisms are explored via numerical sensitivity experiments with a regional climate model (RegCM4.5). The positive/negative sensible heat flux (SH) anomalies were added as a forcing to a key region near 50°N of East Asia in RegCM4.5 to simulate the observed ground surface temperature (GST) anomalies. The model results suggest that the nonuniform land surface warming over the Lake Baikal area (50°–60°N, 90°–120°E) can indeed cause the weakening of the extratropical cyclogenesis and affect the decadal weakening of the EASM. Warm (cold) GST forcing over the key GST region can lead to decreasing (increasing) atmospheric baroclinicity and related energy conversion of the EC activity over the key EC region (40°–50°N, 90°–120°E), resulting in an evidently weakening (enhancing) of the ECs over East Asia. Meanwhile, precipitation shows a dipole pattern with significantly suppressed (enhanced) precipitation in northern and northeastern China, and slightly enhanced (suppressed) rainfall south of 40°N of East Asia, mainly over the East China Sea. Lake Baikal and its adjacent areas are occupied by a strong anticyclonic (cyclonic) circulation while the southeast coastal areas of China have a relatively weak cyclonic (anticyclonic) circulation accompanied with an anomalous northeasterly (southwesterly) wind to the southeast of the anticyclonic circulation, which is opposite to (coincident with) the atmospheric circulation anomalies that are associated with the second mode of the EASM. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Because spring precipitation in East Asia is critical for recharging water resources after dry winters, its spatiotemporal variations and related mechanisms need in-depth research. This study analyzed a leading spatiotemporal variability of precipitation over East Asia for boreal spring (March-May) during 1979 to 2017. We found that a dipole mode dominates the anomalous spring precipitation between southern China and Southeast Asia with significant interannual and decadal variations. The interannual dipole mode is attributable to the eastern Pacific (EP)-type El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) while the decadal dipole mode is related to the decadal variation of the central Pacific (CP)-type ENSO. In the El Niño phases of both time scales, the anticyclonic anomaly over the South China Sea and Philippines causes moisture convergence (divergence) over southern China (Southeast Asia), resulting in positive (negative) precipitation anomalies therein; the opposite occurs in the La Niña phases. The ensemble experiments using the Community Atmosphere Model version 5.1 confirmed that the tropical sea surface temperature (SST) in the EP- and CP-type ENSO can be the major drivers of the interannual and decadal dipole modes, respectively. About half of 15 climate models participating in phase 5 of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (CMIP5) showed that the El Niño phase of dipole mode will become dominant in the future. The individual models' future projections however considerably vary, implying that there is still large uncertainty. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The dynamic origin of the interannual variability of West China autumn rainfall (WCAR), a special weather/climate phenomenon over western-central China in September and October, was investigated via observational diagnosis and numerical simulations. Here we found that the interannual variability ofWCARis closely related to the local horizontal trough, which is passively induced by two lower-level anticyclonic (high pressure) anomalies over East Asia. The anticyclonic anomaly over the south is a Gill-type response to the central and eastern Pacific diabatic cooling, while that over the north is part of the mid- to high-latitude barotropic Rossby wave train, which could be induced by either the thermal forcing of the central and eastern Pacific Ocean sea surface temperature (SST) cooling or that of the subtropical northern Atlantic Ocean SST warming. The quasi-barotropic high pressure anomaly over East Asia acts as an ''invisible mountain'' that steers the low-level anomalous southwesterly into a southeasterly and hinders the water vapor going farther to the north, leading to enhanced WCAR. However, the real mountain ranges in the region (the Qinglin and Ba Mountains) have no essential impact on the formation and interannual variability of WCAR. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Mesoscale convective systems (MCSs) play an important role in modulating the global water cycle and energy balance and frequently generate high-impact weather events. The majority of existing literature studying MCS activity over East Asia is based on specific case studies and more climatological investigations revealing the precipitation characteristics of MCSs over eastern China are keenly needed. In this study, we use an iterative rain cell tracking method to identify and track MCS precipitation during 2008-16 to investigate regional differences and seasonal variations of MCS precipitation characteristics. Our results show that the middle-to-lower reaches of the Yangtze River basin (YRB-ML) receive the largest amount and exhibit the most pronounced seasonal cycle of MCS precipitation in eastern China. MCS precipitation over YRB-ML can exceed 2.6mmday-1 in June, contributing over 30.0% of April-July total rainfall. Particularly long-lived MCSs occur over the eastern periphery of the Tibetan Plateau (ETP), with 25% of MCSs over the ETP persisting for more than 18 h in spring. In addition, spring MCSs feature larger rainfall areas, longer durations, and faster propagation speeds. Summer MCSs have a higher precipitation intensity and a more pronounced diurnal cycle except for southeastern China, where MCSs have similar precipitation intensity in spring and summer. There is less MCS precipitation in autumn, but an MCSprecipitation center over the ETP still persists. MCSs reach peak hourly rainfall intensities during the time of maximum growth (a few hours after genesis), reach their maximum size around 5 h after genesis, and start decaying thereafter. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The East Asian summer monsoon is unique among summer monsoon systems in its complex seasonality, exhibiting distinct intraseasonal stages. Previous studies have alluded to the downstream influence of the westerlies flowing around the Tibetan Plateau as key to its existence. We explore this hypothesis using an atmospheric general circulation model that simulates the intraseasonal stages with fidelity. Without a Tibetan Plateau, East Asia exhibits only one primary convective stage typical of other monsoons. As the plateau is introduced, the distinct rainfall stages—spring, pre-mei-yu, mei-yu, and midsummer—emerge, and rainfall becomes more intense overall. This emergence coincides with a pronounced modulation of the westerlies around the plateau and extratropical northerlies penetrating northeastern China. The northerlies meridionally constrain the moist southerly flow originating from the tropics, leading to a band of lower-tropospheric convergence and humidity front that produces the rainband. The northward migration of the westerlies away from the northern edge of the plateau leads to a weakening of the extratropical northerlies, which, coupled with stronger monsoonal southerlies, leads to the northward migration of the rainband. When the peak westerlies migrate north of the plateau during the midsummer stage, the extratropical northerlies disappear, leaving only the monsoon low-level circulation that penetrates northeastern China; the rainband disappears, leaving isolated convective rainfall over northeastern China. In short, East Asian rainfall seasonality results from the interaction of two seasonally evolving circulations—the monsoonal southerlies that strengthen and extend northward, and the midlatitude northerlies that weaken and eventually disappear—as summer progresses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The relationship between the tropical west Pacific (TWP) and East Asian summer monsoon/precipitation has been documented in previous studies. However, the stability for the signals of midsummer precipitation in the TWP sea surface temperature (SST_TWP), which is important for climate variation, has drawn little attention. This study identifies a strengthened relationship between the leading empirical orthogonal function mode (EOF1) of midsummer precipitation over Northeast China (NEC) and the SST_TWP after the mid-1990s. The EOF1 mode shows a significant positive correlation with the SST_TWP for 1996–2016, whereas the relationship is statistically insignificant for 1961–90. Further results indicate that the North Pacific multidecadal oscillation (NPMO) shifts to a positive phase after the 1990s. In the positive NPMO phase, the anomalous circulation over the northeast Pacific expands westward over the central North Pacific–Aleutian Islands region. Concurrently, the SST_TWP-associated wavelike pattern propagates northeastward from the west Pacific to the northwest Pacific and farther to the North Pacific, facilitating the poleward expansion and intensification of the SST_TWP-related circulation anomalies over the North Pacific. Therefore, the SST_TWP has an enhanced influence on NEC precipitation through the modulation of the circulation anomalies over the central North Pacific–Aleutian Islands region after the mid-1990s. Additionally, the tropical anticyclone/cyclone associated with the SST_TWP expands westward to South China, exerting an intensified impact on meridional wind anomalies along eastern China and on moisture transport over NEC. These conditions jointly contribute to the strengthened relationship between the SST_TWP and the EOF1 mode of NEC midsummer precipitation after the mid-1990s. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent studies demonstrated the existence of a conspicuous atmospheric combination mode (C-mode) originating from nonlinear interactions between El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and the Pacific warm pool annual cycle (AC). Here we find that the C-mode exhibits prominent decadal amplitude variations during the ENSO decaying boreal spring season. It is revealed that the Atlantic multidecadal oscillation (AMO) can largely explain this waxing and waning in amplitude. A robust positive correlation between ENSO and the C-mode is detected during a negative AMO phase but not during a positive phase. Similar results can also be found in the relationship of ENSO with 1) the western North Pacific (WNP) anticyclone and 2) spring precipitation over southern China, both of which are closely associated with the C-mode. We suggest that ENSO property changes due to an AMO modulation play a crucial role in determining these decadal shifts. During a positive AMO phase, ENSO events are distinctly weaker than those in an AMO negative phase. In addition, El Niño events concurrent with a positive AMO phase tend to exhibit a westward-shifted sea surface temperature (SST) anomaly pattern. These SST characteristics during the positive AMO phase are both not conducive to the development of the meridionally asymmetric C-mode atmospheric circulation pattern and thus reduce the ENSO/C-mode correlation on decadal time scales. These observations can be realistically reproduced by a coupled general circulation model (CGCM) experiment in which North Atlantic SSTs are nudged to reproduce a 50-yr sinusoidally varying AMO evolution. Our conclusion carries important implications for understanding seasonally modulated ENSO dynamics and multiscale climate impacts over East Asia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The East Asian summer monsoon (EASM) intensified during the early to mid-Holocene relative to the present primarily due to orbital forcing. However, on the regional scale, changes in the monsoonal precipitation exhibit considerable spatial disparity, and the underlying mechanisms remain unresolved. In this study, the dynamic processes responsible for the difference of the EASM precipitation between the mid-Holocene and preindustrial period are systematically examined using the CMIP5 multimodel simulations. The moisture budget diagnostic identifies vertical motion as the key factor determining the cross-like precipitation pattern in East Asia. Relative to the preindustrial period, the mid-Holocene anomalous ascending motion corresponds well with the excessive precipitation over northern and southern China, and vice versa for west-central China, the Korean peninsula, Japan, and its marginal seas. In the framework of the moist static energy budget, the increased insolation and the attendant intensification of land–sea thermal contrast give rise to anomalous ascending motions, while descending motions are fundamentally forced by the decreased latitudinal insolation gradient. In particular, thermodynamic changes, namely, the reduced pole–equator temperature and humidity gradients, account for the downward motions over the northwestern Pacific. Dynamic changes, namely, the weakened westerlies, play a leading role in suppressing updrafts in west-central China. This study highlights that the orbital-scale monsoonal precipitation changes are not solely determined by local radiative forcing as repeatedly emphasized before. The latitudinal uneven distribution of insolation is crucial to explain the spatial inhomogeneity in the EASM precipitation changes during the Holocene. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Hybrid Single-Particle Lagrangian Integrated Trajectory (HYSPLIT) platform is used to simulate Lagrangian trajectories of air parcels in East China during the summer monsoon. The investigation includes four distinct stages of the East Asian summer monsoon (EASM) during its seasonal migration from south to north. Correspondingly, the main water vapor channel migrates from the west Pacific Ocean (PO) for the premonsoon in South China (SC) to the Indian Ocean (IO) for the monsoon in SC and in the Yangtze--Huaihe River basin, and finally back to the PO for the terminal stage of monsoon in North China. Further calculations permit us to determine water vapor source regions and water vapor contribution to precipitation in East China. To a large extent, moisture leading to precipitation does not come from the strongest water vapor pathways. For example, the proportions of trajectories from the IO are larger than 25% all of the time, but moisture contributions to actual precipitation are smaller than 10%. This can be explained by the large amount of water vapor lost in the pathways across moisture-losing areas such as the Indian and Indochina Peninsulas. Local water vapor recycling inside East China (EC) contributes significantly to regional precipitation, with contributions mostly over 30%, although the trajectory proportions from subregions in EC are all under 10%. This contribution rate can even exceed 55% for the terminal stage of the monsoon in North China. Such a result provides important guidance to understand the role of land surface conditions in modulating rainfall in North China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the early 1990s, the mei-yu rainfall over South China in early boreal summer exhibited an abrupt change and northward extension. This change altered the pattern of East Asian summer rainfall from a dipole-like to a monopole-like pattern; that is, the out-of-phase relationship between the rainfall in the south and that in the north of the Yangtze and Huaihe River valley changed to an in-phase relationship. The physical processes potentially responsible for triggering this abrupt change were analyzed in this study. Our observations revealed that the western North Pacific subtropical high (WNPSH), sea surface temperature (SST) in the subtropical eastern North Pacific (SENP), and the mei-yu rainfall in South China exhibited an abrupt increase in the early 1990s, suggesting that these factors are correlated. From the observations and results of numerical experiments, we proposed that the abrupt SST warming in the SENP in the early 1990s generated an east-west overturning circulation anomaly in the Pacific Ocean and that the anomalous downward motion in the western North Pacific consequently triggered the abrupt increase and westward extension of the WNPSH in the early 1990s. The enhanced and westward extension of WNPSH created a low-level southeasterly anomaly that transported considerable humid and warm air into East Asia and sequentially triggered the abrupt increase of mei-yu rainfall in the South China in the early 1990s. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Previous studies have noted that a strong El Niño event occurring in the preceding winter will result in westward stretching of the western North Pacific subtropical high (WPSH) in the following summer, causing anomalously high precipitation in the Yangtze–Huaihe River basin and anomalously low precipitation in southern China. The winters preceding the summers of 1998 and 2016 featured strong El Niño events, which, along with the El Niño event of 1982, represented the strongest El Niño events since 1950. Under these similar El Niño event backgrounds, the July precipitation anomaly in 2016 was similar to that in 1998, but the August precipitation anomalies in the two years featured opposite distributions. According to the atmospheric circulation analysis, we found that an anomalous ascending motion appeared over the Indian Ocean, while an anomalous descending motion appeared over the Pacific Ocean in August 1998. In addition, the WPSH stretched westward over southern China. However, the atmospheric circulation distribution in August 2016 was the opposite of that in 1998, and the WPSH was divided into eastern and western parts by the anomalous western Pacific cyclone. Further analysis showed that the number of tropical cyclones and typhoons over the western Pacific Ocean increased significantly in August 2016, and their activities were concentrated in the South China Sea (SCS)–southern China region and the western Pacific Ocean, resulting in the division of the WPSH. Therefore, the numbers, tracks, and strengths of tropical cyclones and typhoons were responsible for the differences in the anomalous precipitation distributions over the East Asia–Pacific Ocean region between August 2016 and August 1998. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study investigated the extratropical circulation anomalies responsible for cold surges over the South China Sea in winter. The surge events were identified by the intensity of northerly winds over 110°–117.5°E along 15°N at 925 hPa. Two distinct patterns of sea level pressure (SLP) anomalies in East Asia were found to have a crucial role in inducing cold surges over the South China Sea. Accordingly, the cold surge events were classified into two types. The first type of cold surge is characterized by a pair of SLP anomalies with positive and negative ones centered over China and Japan, respectively, whereas the second type of cold surge is characterized by widespread and persistent positive SLP anomalies over East Asia. Furthermore, the first type of cold surge is accompanied by a deepened East Asian trough and precursory Rossby wave trains across the Eurasian continent in the mid- and upper troposphere, but the latter is not. Prior to both types of the cold surges, the Siberian high is significantly intensified. However, diagnosis of the SLP tendency indicates that the intensification is related to different physical processes. In the first type of cold surge, the Rossby wave trains favor negative vorticity advection and cold advection, inducing intensification of the Siberian high. By contrast, in the second type of cold surge, vorticity advection can be ignored due to the lack of Rossby wave trains, and only the lower-tropospheric cold advection induced by anomalous northerly winds, resulting from the anomalous Siberian high, contributes to the further intensification of the Siberian high. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Observational analysis indicates significant decadal changes in daytime, nighttime, and compound (both daytime and nighttime) heat waves (HWs) over China across the mid-1990s, featuring a rapid increase in frequency, intensity, and spatial extent. The variations of these observed decadal changes are assessed by the comparison between the present day (PD) of 1994–2011 and the early period (EP) of 1964–81. The compound HWs change most remarkably in all three aspects, with frequency averaged over China in the PD tripling that in the EP and intensity and spatial extent nearly doubling. The daytime and nighttime HWs also change significantly in all three aspects. A set of numerical experiments is used to investigate the drivers and physical processes responsible for the decadal changes of the HWs. Results indicate the predominant role of the anthropogenic forcing, including changes in greenhouse gas (GHG) concentrations and anthropogenic aerosol (AA) emissions in the HW decadal changes. The GHG changes have dominant impacts on the three types of HWs, while the AA changes make significant influences on daytime HWs. The GHG changes increase the frequency, intensity, and spatial extent of the three types of HWs over China both directly via the strengthened greenhouse effect and indirectly via land–atmosphere and circulation feedbacks in which GHG-change-induced warming in sea surface temperature plays an important role. The AA changes decrease the frequency and intensity of daytime HWs over Southeastern China through mainly aerosol–radiation interaction, but increase the frequency and intensity of daytime HWs over Northeastern China through AA-change-induced surface–atmosphere feedbacks and dynamical changes related to weakened East Asian summer monsoon. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The simulations of summertime diurnal cycle of precipitation and low-level winds by the Community Atmosphere Model, version 5, are evaluated over subtropical East Asia. The evaluation reveals the physical cause of the observed diurnal rainfall variation in East Asia and points to the source of model strengths and weaknesses. Two model versions with horizontal resolutions of 2.8° and 0.5° are used. The models can reproduce the diurnal phase of large-scale winds over East Asia, with an enhanced low-level southwesterly in early morning. Correspondingly, models successfully simulated the diurnal variation of stratiform rainfall with a maximum in early morning. However, the simulated convective rainfall occurs at local noontime, earlier than observations and with larger amplitude (normalized by the daily mean). As a result, models simulated a weaker diurnal cycle in total rainfall over the western plain of China due to an out-of-phase cancellation between convective and stratiform rainfalls and a noontime maximum of total rainfall over the eastern plain of China. Over the East China Sea, models simulated the early-morning maximum of convective precipitation and, together with the correct phase of the stratiform rainfall, they captured the diurnal cycle of total precipitation. The superposition of the stratiform and convective rainfalls also explains the observed diurnal cycle in total rainfall in East Asia. Relative to the coarse-resolution model, the high-resolution model simulated slight improvement in diurnal rainfall amplitudes, due to the larger amplitude of stratiform rainfall. The two models, however, suffer from the same major biases in rainfall diurnal cycles due to the convection parameterization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The hypothesis that regional characteristics of the East Asian summer monsoon (EASM) result from the presence of nonlinear coupled features that modulate the seasonal circulation and rainfall at the intraseasonal time scale is advanced in this study. To examine this hypothesis, the authors undertake the analysis of daily EASM variability using a nonlinear multivariate data classifying algorithm known as self-organizing mapping (SOM). On the basis of various SOM node analyses, four major intraseasonal phases of the EASM are identified. The first node describes a circulation state corresponding to weak tropical and subtropical pressure systems, strong upper-level jets, weakened monsoonal winds, and cyclonic upper-level vorticity. This mode, related to large rainfall anomalies in southeast China and southern Japan, is identified as the mei-yu-baiu phase. The second node represents a distinct circulation state corresponding to a strengthened subtropical high, monsoonal winds, and anticyclonic upper-level vorticity in southeast Korea, which is identified as the changma phase. The third node is related to copious rain over Korea following changma, which we name the postchangma phase. The fourth node is situated diagonally opposite the changma mode. Because Korea experiences a dry spell associated with this SOM node, it is referred to as the dry-spell phase. The authors also demonstrate that a strong modulation of the changma and dry-spell phases on interannual time scales occurs during El Niño and La Niña years. Results imply that the key to predictability of the EASM on interannual time scales may lie with analysis and exploitation of its nonlinear characteristics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examines whether there exist significant differences in tropical cyclone (TC) landfall between central Pacific (CP) El Niño, eastern Pacific (EP) El Niño, and La Niña during the peak TC season (June-October) and how and to what extent CP El Niño influences TC landfall over East Asia for the period 1961-2009. The peak TC season is subdivided into summer [June-August (JJA)] and autumn [September-October (SO)]. The results are summarized as follows: (i) during the summer of CP El Niño years, TCs are more likely to make landfall over East Asia because of a strong easterly steering flow anomaly induced by the westward shift of the subtropical high and northward-shifted TC genesis. In particular, TCs have a greater probability of making landfall over Japan and Korea during the summer of CP El Niño years. (ii) In the autumn of CP El Niño years, TC landfall in most areas of East Asia, especially Indochina, the Malay Peninsula, and the Philippines, is likely to be suppressed because the large-scale circulation resembles that of EP El Niño years. (iii) During the whole peak TC season [June-October (JJASO)] of CP El Niño years, TCs are more likely to make landfall over Japan and Korea. TC landfall in East Asia as a whole has an insignificant association with CP El Niño during the peak TC season. In addition, more (less) TCs are likely to make landfall in China, Indochina, the Malay Peninsula, and the Philippines during the peak TC season of La Niña (EP El Niño) years. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Numerous studies have been conducted on the impact of soil moisture on the climate, but few studies have attempted to diagnose the linkage between soil moisture and climate variability using observational data. Here, using both observed and reanalysis data, the spring (April--May) soil moisture is found to have a significant impact on the summer (June--August) monsoon circulation over East Asia and precipitation in east China by changing surface thermal conditions. In particular, the spring soil moisture over a vast region from the lower and middle reaches of the Yangtze River valley to north China (the YRNC region) is significantly correlated to the summer precipitation in east China. When the YRNC region has a wetter soil in spring, northeast China and the lower and middle reaches of the Yangtze River valley would have abnormally higher precipitation in summer, while the region south of the Yangtze River valley would have abnormally lower precipitation. An analysis of the physical processes linking the spring soil moisture to the summer precipitation indicates that the soil moisture anomaly across the YRNC region has a major impact on the surface energy balance. Abnormally wet soil would increase surface evaporation and hence decrease surface air temperature ( Ta). The reduced Ta in late spring would narrow the land--sea temperature difference, resulting in the weakened East Asian monsoon in an abnormally strengthened western Pacific subtropical high that is also located farther south than its normal position. This would then enhance precipitation in the Yangtze River valley. Conversely, the abnormally weakened East Asian summer monsoon allows the western Pacific subtropical high to wander to south of the Yangtze River Valley, resulting in an abnormally reduced precipitation in the southern part of the country in east China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Seasonal variations of the synoptic-scale transient eddy activity (STEA) and the jet streams over East Asia are examined through analysis of the 40-yr European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) Re-Analysis (ERA-40) data. Extracted from the 6-hourly upper-level wind fields, the distribution of the jet core numbers exhibits a distinct geographical border for the East Asian subtropical jet (EASJ) and the East Asian polar front jet (EAPJ) at the latitudes of the northern Tibetan Plateau (TP). In the cool seasons, two branches of the STEA and low-level baroclinicity exist over the East Asian landmass, accompanied by the two-jet state of the EASJ and EAPJ. In the warm seasons, a single jet pattern of the EASJ along the north flank of the TP is accompanied by the weakened STEA over the mid- to high latitudes of East Asia. Further analysis shows two distinct features of the seasonal variations of the STEA over East Asia, compared with that over the North Pacific. First, during the transitional period of April–June, the main STEA band over East Asia migrates northward dramatically, in conjunction with the EAPJ shifting in the same direction. Second, both the upper-level STEA and the lower-level baroclinicity poleward of the TP are prosperous in spring. The relationship between the STEA, baroclinicity, vertical wind shear, and static stability in the EAPJ region in different seasons is further investigated. It is found that in addition to the time-mean wind fields, the rapid increase in the sensible heat flux poleward side of the TP region in spring and the associated boundary layer processes are partially responsible for the spring prosperity of the local baroclinicity and the STEA. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The lower reach of the Yangtze River basin (LYRB) is located at the central region of the mei-yu and baiu front, which represents the subtropical East Asian (EA) summer monsoon. Based on the newly released daily rainfall data, two dominant intraseasonal variation (ISV) modes are identified over the LYRB during boreal summer (May–August), with spectral peaks occurring on day 15 (the biweekly mode) and day 24 (the 21–30-day mode). These two modes have comparable intensities, and together they account for above about 57% of the total intraseasonal variance. Both ISV modes exhibit baroclinic structures over the LYRB at their extreme phases. However, the genesis and evolutions associated with the two modes are different. Considering the genesis of their extreme wet phases over the LYRB, the biweekly mode is initiated by a midlatitude jet stream vorticity anomaly moving southeastward, while the 21–30-day mode is primarily associated with a low-level westward propagation of an anticyclonic anomaly from 145° to 120°E, which reflects the westward extension of the western North Pacific subtropical high (WNPSH). The development of the biweekly mode at LYRB is enhanced by the northwestward movement of a low-level anticyclonic anomaly from the Philippine Sea to the south of Taiwan, which is a result of the enhancement of the WNPSH resulting from its merger with a transient midlatitude high. In contrast, the development of the 21–30-day mode is enhanced by an upper-level trough anomaly moving from Lake Baikal to far east Russia. These two ISV periodicities are also found to be embedded in their corresponding source regions. The new knowledge on the sources and evolutions of the two major LYRB ISV modes provides empirical predictors for the intraseasonal variation in the subtropical EA summer monsoon. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In Part I the authors have shown that heating sources in spring over the Tibetan Plateau (TP), and in particular the sensible heat flux (SHF), exhibit a significant weakening trend since the mid-1980s that is induced mainly by decreased surface wind speed. The possible reason of such a change is further investigated in Part II by analyzing historical observations and the NCEP/Department of Energy (DOE) reanalysis. The steady declining trend in the surface wind speed over the TP after the 1970s arises mainly from the zonal component. Since the mean altitude of the TP is about 600 hPa and the surface flow is controlled by the East Asian subtropical westerly jet (EASWJ) for most parts of the year, the substantial tropospheric warming in the mid- and high latitudes to the north of the plateau results in a decrease of the meridional pressure gradient in the subtropics. As a result, the EASWJ and the surface winds over the TP are decelerated. Moreover, changes of the general circulation in the twentieth century simulated by 16 coupled climate models driven by natural and anthropogenic forcings are examined. Intercomparison results suggest that sulfate aerosol indirect effects and ozone may be important in reproducing the weakening trend in EASWJ. Although nearly half of the models can successfully reproduce the observed trends in the EASWJ during the last two decades, there is an obvious spread in simulation of the spatial patterns of twentieth-century tropospheric temperatures, suggesting significant room still exists for improvement of the current state-of-the-art coupled climate models. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Part I. Examines the interannual and interdecadal variations of the East Asian summer monsoon and tropical pacific sea surface temperatures. Role of the subtropical ridge on the variations; Use of rainfall data in the Yangtze River Valley in China; Division of the datasets into two periods.