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Education needs to be at the forefront of the efforts to mitigate and adapt to Climate Change (CC) effects. We have introduced the Climate Change Competence (C3) to provide a comprehensive route to include the topics of sustainability and CC into the curriculum. This paper analyses how different primary and secondary teachers can improve this competence using a Massive Online Open Course (MOOC) on the basic science of CC. While the improvement in knowledge is expected, we have observed important advances on abilities, and attitudes on CC which are also essential to teach about CC mitigation and adaptation. The present study used a pre-experimental design, with pre-and post-test measurements with a sample of 530 students. While the MOOC focuses on the Science of CC, the participants also advance in attitudes and abilities, revealing an important correlation between these three dimensions of competence. Also, the study reveals that the MOOC improves the C3 in all the participants, but it does in diverse ways for diverse groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Various analyses show that right-wing populist parties (RWP) tend to be sceptical of climate science and policy. This points to a blank space in the dominant analyses of populism: their blindness towards society-nature relations. This paper aims to develop an approach grounded in Cultural Political Economy (CPE) that can be used to decipher the mediation of RWP within the context of economic, political, and cultural developments as well as society–nature relations. Against this background, the argument is developed that RWP is concerned not only with countering migration and processes of societal liberalisation, but also with defending an existing way of life that is firmly rooted in the destructive appropriation of nature. As a current of right-wing politics, RWP defends the imperial mode of living by expressing scepticism towards the existence of anthropogenic climate change. The paper contributes to a better understanding of the political economy of RWP by linking the dimensions of social domination with the appropriation of nature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper makes an argument for a geography of girlhood, located at the intersection of historical geographies of globalisation and empire on the one hand, and feminist interventions in the geography of childhood and youth on the other. A focus on girlhood, I argue, opens up a debate on the discipline's own implication in a debate on climate science, moral hierarchies of civilisation and reproductive health at which intersection the category of 'girl' was materialised in the 19th century. This focus extends and historicises the argument made by scholars like Nicola Ansel that geographies of childhood speak not only to intimate scales of experience ‐ such as the home and neighbourhood—but instead suggest the ways in which everyday life is implicated in the scale of the global and the geopolitical. Drawing on an inter‐disciplinary scholarship, the paper argues that debates on gender and maturity—converging on the figure of the 'girl'—shaped raced and classed imaginaries of progress in the 19th and 20th centuries. Through this, the paper demonstrates that 'girlhood' is at the heart of historical geographies of urban planning, social care, and health, as well as indexing the continuities in the transition from a colonial discourse of civilisation to a mid‐20th century concern with development. Finally, the paper asks how to write about girls through an archive that is almost obsessively fixated on them as subjects of education and reform, even whilst they rarely appear in it as speaking subjects. I argue that both an emergent focus on non‐textual objects as sources, as well as the use of ephemeral material—including notes, creative writing exercises from the classroom, school diaries etc.—alongside the official archive might open the scholarship up to a multi‐scalar analysis of girlhood as imbricated in larger global and national discursive and material practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on the best-track dataset from the Shanghai Typhoon Institute/China Meteorological Administration, the paper provides a comprehensive summary and analysis of tropical cyclone (TC) activities in the Western North Pacific (WNP) and the South China Sea (SCS) for 2022. Using the historical climatology from 1951 to 2020, the anomalous conditions during 2022 in TC frequency, origin locations, tracks, intensity, and duration for the entire ocean basin as well as landfall events in China are examined. Results show that the overall TC frequency is slightly lower than normal, but the multiple TC events have a very high frequency of occurrence. Origin locations of TCs, which mark the starting points of their paths, show a large westward and northward deviation from climatology. Around 40% of the named TCs exhibit a shift in their direction of movement from westerly to easterly. Additionally, comparisons of the means, medians, upper and lower quartiles all indicate that the intensity of TCs in 2022 is generally lower than the climatology, with the duration of TCs at tropical storm intensity or above being shorter than usual. A notable observation is the fewer incidence of TC landfalls in China, but with a geographical concentration in Guangdong Province. These anomalous annual TC activities are influenced by related atmospheric and oceanic environmental conditions modulated by multi-scale climate variability. The findings provide useful information for enhancing disaster mitigation strategies in the Asia-Pacific region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Gridded precipitation (PRP) data have been largely used in diagnostic studies on the climate variability in several time scales, as well as to validate model results. The three most used gauge-based PRP datasets are from the Global Precipitation Climatology Centre (GPCC), University of Delaware (UDEL), and Climate Research Unit (CRU). This paper evaluates the performance of these datasets in reproducing spatiotemporal PRP climatological features over the entire South America (SA) for the 1901–2015 period, aiming to identify the differences and similarities among the datasets as well as time intervals and areas with potential uncertainties involved with these datasets. Comparisons of the PRP annual means and variances between the 1901–2015 period and the non-overlapping 30-year subperiods of 1901–1930, 1931–1960, 1961–1990, and the 25-year subperiod of 1991–2015 for each dataset show varying means of the annual PRP over SA depending on the subperiod and dataset. Consistent patterns among datasets are found in most of southeastern SA and southeastern Brazil, where they evolved gradually from less to more rainy conditions from 1901–1930 to the 1991–2015 subperiod. All three datasets present limitations and uncertainties in regions with poor coverage of gauge stations, where the differences among datasets are more pronounced. In particular, the GPCC presents reduced PRP variability in an extensive area west of 50° W and north of 20° S during the 1901–1930 subperiod. In monthly time scale, PRP time series in two areas show differences among the datasets for periods before 1941, which are likely due to spurious or missing data: central Bolivia (CBO), and central Brazil (CBR). The GPCC has less monthly variability before 1940 than the other two datasets in these two areas, and UDEL presents reduced monthly variability before 1940 and spurious monthly values from May to September of the years from 1929 to 1941 in CBO. Thus, studies with these three datasets might lead to different results depending on the study domain and period of analysis, in particular for those including years before 1941. The results here might be relevant for future diagnostic and modelling studies on climate variability from interannual to multidecadal time scales. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Fear of anthropogenic "global warming" can adversely affect patients' well-being. Accordingly, the state of the scientific consensus about climate change was studied by a review of the 539 papers on "global climate change" found on the Web of Science database from January 2004 to mid-February 2007, updating research by Oreskes, who had reported that between 1993 and 2003 none of 928 scientific papers on "global climate change" had rejected the consensus that more than half of the warming of the past 50 years was likely to have been anthropogenic. In the present review, 31 papers (6% of the sample) explicitly or implicitly reject the consensus. Though Oreskes said that 75% of the papers in her former sample endorsed the consensus, fewer than half now endorse it. Only 7% do so explicitly. Only one paper refers to "catastrophic" climate change, but without offering evidence. There appears to be little evidence in the learned journals to justify the climate-change alarm that now harms patients. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The upper troposphere/lower stratosphere (UTLS) plays a crucial role in the climate system. Changes in the composition and dynamic structure of this atmospheric region result in particularly large changes in the atmospheric radiation balance. Quantifying the physical and chemical processes that control UTLS composition therefore represents an important task. Currently, there is a lack of UTLS observations with sufficient three-dimensional resolution. The Gimballed Limb Observer for Radiance Imaging of the Atmosphere (GLORIA) aircraft instrument addresses this observational lack by providing observations of numerous trace constituents as well as temperature and cloud structures with an unprecedented combination of vertical resolution (up to 300 m) and horizontal resolution (up to 20kmx20km). As a result, important scientific questions concerning stratosphere-troposphere-exchange, the occurrence of subvisible cirrus clouds in the lowermost stratosphere (LMS), polar chemistry and gravity wave processes can be addressed, as reviewed in this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The ammonia cycle and nitrate particle formation have been introduced in the LMDz- INCA global model. Both fine nitrate particles formation in the accumulation mode and coarse nitrate forming on existing dust and sea-salt particles are considered. The model simulates distributions of nitrates and related species in agreement with previous studies and observations. The calculated present-day total nitrate direct radiative forcing since the pre-industrial is -0.056Wm-2. This forcing has the same magnitude than the forcing associated with organic carbon particles and represents 18% of the sulfate forcing. Fine particles largely dominate the nitrate forcing representing close to 90% of this value. The model has been used to investigate the future changes in nitrates and direct radiative forcing of climate based on snapshot simulations for the four Representative Concentration Pathway (RCP) scenarios and for the 2030, 2050 and 2100 time horizons. Due to a decrease in fossil fuel emissions in the future, the concentrations of most of the species involved in the nitrate-ammonium-sulfate system drop by 2100 except for ammonia which originates from agricultural practices and for which emissions significantly increase in the future. Despite the decrease of nitrate surface levels in Europe and Northern America, the global burden of accumulation mode nitrates increases by up to a factor of 2.6 in 2100. This increase in nitrate in the future arises despite decreasing NOx emissions due to increased availability of ammonia to form ammonium nitrate. The total aerosol direct forcing decreases from its present-day value of -0.234Wm-2 to a range of -0.070 to -0.130Wm-2 in 2100 based on the considered scenario. The direct forcing decreases for all aerosols except for nitrates for which the direct negative forcing increases to a range of -0.060 to -0.115Wm-2 in 2100. Including nitrates in the radiative forcing calculations increases the total direct forcing of aerosols by a factor of 1.3 in 2000, by a factor of 1.7-2.6 in 2030, by 1.9-4.8 in 2050 and by 6.4-8.6 in 2100. These results show that agricultural emissions of ammonia will play a key role in the future mitigation of climate change with nitrates becoming the dominant contributor to the anthropogenic aerosol optical depth during the second half of the XXIst century and significantly increasing the calculated aerosol direct forcing. This significant increase in the influence that nitrate exert on climate in the future will at the same time affect regional air quality and nitrogen deposition to the ecosystems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the impact of climate change on rich and poor countries across the world. We measure two indices of the relative impact of climate across countries, impact per capita, and impact per GDP. These measures sum market impacts across the climate-sensitive economic sectors of each country. Both indices reveal that climate change will have serious distributional impact across countries, grouped by income per capita. We predict that poor countries will suffer the bulk of the damages from climate change. Although adaptation, wealth, and technology may influence distributional consequences across countries, we argue that the primary reason that poor countries are so vulnerable is their location. Countries in the low latitudes start with very high temperatures. Further warming pushes these countries ever further away from optimal temperatures for climate-sensitive economic sectors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Degradation of coastal ecosystems by eutrophication is largely defined by nitrogen loading from land via surface and groundwater flows. However, indicators of water quality are highly variable due to a myriad of other drivers, including temperature and precipitation. To evaluate these drivers, we examined spatial and temporal trends in a 22 year record of summer water quality data from 122 stations in 17 embayments within Buzzards Bay, MA (USA), collected through a citizen science monitoring program managed by Buzzards Bay Coalition. To identify spatial patterns across Buzzards Bay's embayments, we used a principle component and factor analysis and found that rotated factor loadings indicated little correlation between inorganic nutrients and organic matter and chlorophyll a (Chl a) concentration. Factor scores showed that embayment geomorphology in addition to nutrient loading was a strong driver of water quality, where embayments with surface water inputs showed larger biological impacts than embayments dominated by groundwater influx. A linear regression analysis of annual summertime water quality indicators over time revealed that from 1992 to 2013, most embayments (15 of 17) exhibited an increase in temperature (mean rate of 0.082 ± 0.025 (SD) °C yr-1) and Chl a (mean rate of 0.0171 ± 0.0088 log10 (Chl a; mgm-3)yr-1, equivalent to a 4.0% increase per year). However, only 7 embayments exhibited an increase in total nitrogen (TN) concentration (mean rate 0.32 ± 0.47 (SD)μM yr-1). Average summertime log10 (TN) and log10 (Chl a) were correlated with an indication that yield of Chl a per unit total nitrogen increased with time suggesting the estuarine response to TN may have changed because of other stressors such as warming, altered precipitation patterns, or changing light levels. These findings affirm that nitrogen loading and physical aspects of embayments are essential in explaining observed ecosystem response. However, climate-related stressors may also need to be considered by managers because increased temperature and precipitation may worsen water quality and partially offset benefits achieved by reducing nitrogen loading. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Climate change impacts on the marine biogeochemistry and lower trophic level dynamics in the North Sea and Baltic Sea have been assessed using regional downscaling in a number of recent studies. However, most of these where only forced by physical conditions from Global Climate Models (GCMs) and regional downscaling considering the climate change impact on oceanic nutrient conditions from Global Earth System Models (ESMs) are rare and so far solely based on CMIP3-generation climate models. The few studies published show a large range in projected future primary production and hydrodynamic condition. With the addition of CMIP5 models and scenarios, the demand to explore the uncertainty in regional climate change projections increased. Moreover, the question arises how projections based on CMIP5-generation models compare to earlier projections and multi-model ensembles comprising both AR4 and AR5 generation forcing models. Here, we investigated the potential future climate change impacts to the North Sea and the Baltic Sea ecosystem using a coherent regional downscaling strategy based on the regional coupled bio-physical model ECOSMO. ECOSMO was forced by output from different ESMs from both CMIP3 and CMIP5 models. Multi-model ensembles using CMIP3/A1B and CMIP5/RCP4.5 scenarios are examined, where the selected CMIP5 models are the successors of the chosen CMIP3 models. Comparing projected changes with the present day reference condition, all these simulations predicted an increase in Sea Surface Temperature (SST) in both North Sea and Baltic Sea, reduction in sea ice in the Baltic, decrease in primary production in the North Sea and an increase in primary production in the Baltic Sea. Despite these largely consistent results on the direction of the projected changes, our results revealed a broad range in the amplitude of projected climate change impacts. Our study strengthens the claim that the choice of the ESM is a major factor for regional climate projections. The change in oceanic nutrient input appeared to be the major driver for the projected changes in North Sea primary production. Assessing the spread in ensemble groups, we found that there is for the North Sea a significant reduction in the spread of projected changes among CMIP5 forced model simulations compared to those forced by CMIP3 ESMs, except for salinity. The latter was due to an unexpected salinification observed in one of the CMIP5 model while all other models exhibit freshening in the future. However, for the Baltic Sea substantial differences in inter-model variability in projected climate change impact to primary production is lacking. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we introduce a bending angle radio occultation climatology (BAROCLIM) based on Formosat-3/COSMIC (F3C) data. This climatology represents the monthlymean atmospheric state from 2006 to 2012. Bending angles from radio occultation (RO) measurements are obtained from the accumulation of the change in the raypath direction of Global Positioning System (GPS) signals. Best quality of these nearvertical profiles is found from the middle troposphere up to the mesosphere. Beside RO bending angles we also use data from the Mass Spectrometer and Incoherent Scatter Radar (MSIS) model to expand BAROCLIM in a spectral model, which (theoretically) reaches from the surface up to infinity. Due to the very high quality of BAROCLIM up to the mesosphere, it can be used to detect deficiencies in current state-of-the-art analysis and reanalysis products from numerical weather prediction (NWP) centers. For bending angles derived from European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) analysis fields from 2006 to 2012, e.g., we find a positive bias of 0.5% to 1% at 40 km, which increases to more than 2% at 50 km. BAROCLIM can also be used as a priori information in RO profile retrievals. In contrast to other a priori information (i.e., MSIS) we find that the use of BAROCLIM better preserves the mean of raw RO measurements. Global statistics of statistically optimized bending angle and refractivity profiles also confirm that BAROCLIM outperforms MSIS. These results clearly demonstrate the utility of BAROCLIM. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We review the main factors driving the calculation of the tangent height of spaceborne limb measurements: the ray-tracing method, the refractive index model and the assumed atmosphere. We find that commonly used ray-tracing and refraction models are very accurate, at least in the middle-infrared. The factor with largest effect in the tangent height calculation is the assumed atmosphere. Using a climatological model in place of the real atmosphere may cause tangent height errors up to ±200 m. Depending on the adopted retrieval scheme, these errors may have a significant impact on the derived profiles. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An important component of the risks from climate change arises from outcomes that are very unlikely, but whose impacts if they were to occur would be extremely severe. Examples include levels of surface warming, or changes in the water cycle, that are at the extreme of plausible ranges, or crossing of a climate system "tipping point" such as ice sheet or ocean circulation instability. If such changes were to occur their impacts on infrastructure or ecosystems may exceed existing plans for adaptation. The traditional approach of ensemble climate change projections is not well suited to managing these High Impact‐Low Likelihood (HILL) risks, where the objective is to "prepare for the worst" rather than to "plan for what's likely." In this paper we draw together a number of ideas from recent literature, to classify four types of HILL climate outcome and to propose the development of a practical "toolkit" of physical climate information that can be used in future to inform HILL risk management. The toolkit consists of several elements that would need to be developed for each plausible HILL climate outcome, then deployed individually to develop targeted HILL risk management approaches for individual sectors. We argue that development of the HILL toolkit should be an important focus for physical climate research over the coming decade, and that the time is right for a focused assessment of HILL risks by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in its 7th Assessment Cycle. Plain Language Summary: To prepare for the risks that arise from climate change (and avoid them where possible), it is important to understand how climate is likely to change in future, and what the impacts are likely to be. Over many years, climate science has developed sophisticated climate projections to estimate these likely impacts, and these are widely used to plan how people and societies will need to adapt to climate change. However it is also important to understand possibilities that are unlikely, but would have even more severe impacts if they did occur—for example, global warming levels at the high end of plausible estimates, or crossing a "tipping point" for major changes in ice sheets or ocean currents. A different type of information is needed to plan for these risks. In this paper we propose a new set of climate information "tools" to respond to these high‐impact risks. The tools include plausible scenarios of extreme outcomes, and early warning systems to detect if they are on the horizon. Combining these new tools with existing climate projections will allow society to understand more fully the risks of climate change, and to plan for the likely effects while preparing for the worst. Key Points: Climate outcomes or events that have a high impact are a key component of climate risk, even if their likelihood is lowTraditional climate projections are of limited use to inform management of high impact‐low likelihood risksPhysical climate science needs an increased focus on storylines, early warning and monitoring to inform management of high impact risks [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

B I Sustainability and Climate Change i b is a peer-reviewed publication dedicated to furthering the science of sustainability, sustainable development, and climate change. Graph: scc.2021.29000.cfp figure1.jpg The editorial team of B I Sustainability and Climate Change i b invites you to submit your manuscript for consideration. [Extracted from the article]

The launch of the US/French mission Topex/Poseidon (T/P) (CNES/NASA) in August 1992 was the start of a revolution in oceanography. For the first time, a very precise altimeter system optimized for large scale sea level and ocean circulation observations was flying. T/P alone could not observe the mesoscale circulation. In the 1990s, the ESA satellites ERS-1/2 were flying simultaneously with T/P. Together with my CLS colleagues, we demonstrated that we could use T/P as a reference mission for ERS-1/2 and bring the ERS-1/2 data to an accuracy level comparable to T/P. Near real time high resolution global sea level anomaly maps were then derived. These maps have been operationally produced as part of the SSALTO/DUACS system for the last 15 yr. They are now widely used by the oceanographic community and have contributed to a much better understanding and recognition of the role and importance of mesoscale dynamics. Altimetry needs to be complemented with global in situ observations. In the end of the 90s, a major international initiative was launched to develop Argo, the global array of profiling floats. This has been an outstanding success. Argo floats now provide the most important in situ observations to monitor and understand the role of the ocean on the earth climate and for operational oceanography. This is a second revolution in oceanography. The unique capability of satellite altimetry to observe the global ocean in near real time at high resolution and the development of Argo were essential to the development of global operational oceanography, the third revolution in oceanography. The Global Ocean Data Assimilation Experiment (GODAE) was instrumental in the development of the required capabilities. This paper provides an historical perspective on the development of these three revolutions in oceanography which are very much interlinked. This is not an exhaustive review and I will mainly focus on the contributions we made together with many colleagues and friends. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

James C. Knox’s 1977 paper “Human Impacts on Wisconsin Stream Channels,” published in the Annals of the Association of American Geographers, was a key component of a suite of three papers by him defining the response of rivers to the introduction and management of agriculture and to climate change. In this paper he used the Driftless Area of southwest Wisconsin as a laboratory where he could define fluvial responses by their sedimentary signatures in floodplain deposits. Land-use records dating back to the early 19th century along with shorter climate records provided his understanding of the drivers of change. He found that floods increased as an outcome of land-cover change. Upstream tributaries became wider and shallower as coarse deposits limited their adjustments, while main stem channels became narrower and deeper. His paper reflected the influence of his graduate advisor and especially of prominent faculty colleagues at the University of Wisconsin from fields ranging from soils and climatology to geomorphology and history. The paper was the subject of considerable debate in the professional community, but it remains a much-cited example of Knox’s work in unraveling the Quaternary and Holocene history of rivers of the Driftless Area and by extension the upper Mississippi River system. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The Global Ozone Monitoring by Occultation of Stars (GOMOS) instrument on board the European platform ENVISAT was dedicated to the study of the atmosphere of the Earth using the stellar occultation technique. The spectral range of the GOMOS spectrometer extends from the UV to the near infrared, allowing for the retrieval of species such as O3, NO2, NO3, H2O, O2, air density, aerosol extinction and OCIO. Nevertheless, OCIO can not be retrieved using a single GOMOS measurement because of the weak signal-to-noise ratio and the small optical thickness associated with this molecule. We present here the method used to detect this molecule by using several GOMOS measurements. It is based on a two-step approach. First, several co-located measurements are combined in a statistical way to build an averaged measurement with a higher signal-to-noise ratio. Then, a Differential Optical Absorption Spectroscopy (DOAS) method is applied to retrieve OCIO slant column densities. The statistics of the sets of GOMOS measurements used to build the averaged measurement and the spectral window selection are analyzed. The obtained retrievals are compared to results from two balloon-borne instruments. It appears that the inter-comparisons of OCIO are generally satisfying. Then, two nighttime climatologies of OCIO slant column densities based on GOMOS averaged measurements are presented. The first depicts annual global pictures of OCIO from 2003 to 2011. From this climatology, the presence of an OCIO layer in the equatorial region at about 35km is confirmed and strong concentrations of OCIO in both polar regions are observed, a sign of chlorine activation. The second climatology is a monthly time series. It clearly shows the chlorine activation of the lower stratosphere during winter. Moreover the equatorial OCIO layer is observed during all the years without any significant variations. Finally, the anti-correlation between OCIO and NO2 is highlighted. This very promising method, applied on GOMOS measurements, allowed us to build the first nighttime climatology of OCIO [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A method for detailed evaluation of a new satellite-derived global 28-yr cloud and radiation climatology (Climate Monitoring SAF Cloud, Albedo and Radiation dataset from AVHRR data, named CLARA-A1) from polar orbiting NOAA and Metop satellites is presented. The method combines 1 km and 5 km resolution cloud datasets from the CALIPSO-CALIOP cloud lidar for estimating cloud detection limitations and the accuracy of cloud top height estimations. Cloud detection is shown to work efficiently for clouds with optical thicknesses above 0.30 except for at twilight conditions when this value increases to 0.45. Some misclassifications generating erroneous clouds over land surfaces in semi-arid regions in the sub-tropical and tropical regions are revealed. In addition, a substantial fraction of all clouds remains undetected in the Polar regions during the polar winter season due to the lack of or an inverted temperature contrast between Earth surfaces and clouds. Subsequent cloud top height evaluation took into account the derived information about the cloud detection limits. It was shown that this has fundamental importance for the achieved results. An overall bias of -274m was achieved compared to a bias of -2762m if no measures were taken to compensate for cloud detection limitations. Despite this improvement it was concluded that high-level clouds still suffer from substantial height underestimations while the opposite is true for low-level (boundary layer) clouds. The validation method and the specifically collected satellite dataset with optimal matching in time and space are suggested for a wider use in the future for evaluation of other cloud retrieval methods based on passive satellite imagery. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents a tagging method, which helps in calculating contribution of individual processes or quantities on state variables for application in climatechemistry models. It also presents 15 differential equations for these contributions or tagged quantities or species. It also discusses possibilities and limitations of this method.

The article presents a study which investigates the comparison of the surface skin temperatures between MODIS and atmospheric infrared sounder (AIRS)/Advanced microwave sounding unit (AMSU) in terms of their trends and climatology. The study uses the bootstrap method to calculate the 95% confidence interval. Results show that the trends of the surface skin temperature from MODIS has revealed a stronger warming values than from AIRS/AMSU over the high latitude oceans.

The article discusses the use of V8.6 algorithm for the development of total ozone and ozone profiles from solar-backscatter ultraviolet (SBUV) instruments. It says that the algorithm features several changes including the integration of new ozone absorption cross-sections and new ozone and cloud height climatologies. It mentions that the SBUV data from the system have high precision for zonal anomalies.

The article presents a study that demonstrates the applications of the Biogeochemical Transport and Reactions (CLM4-BeTR) in regional and global biogeochemistry modeling and climate predictability. It outlines the functions of the model in which its transport code are evaluated through several analytical test cases. The study shows that the method provides detailed comparison between ecosystem observation and predictions.

The article focuses on the different simulation methods used in the Atmospheric Chemistry and Climate Model Intercomparison Project (ACCMIP). The study introduces several simulation approaches to determine the long-term changes in the atmospheric composition between 1850 and 2100 though the ACCMIP project. It outlines the result of the study, which indicates that the present-day climate diagnostics are consistent with the state-of-the-art climate models.

The article presents a study that investigates the effectiveness of Earth System Model (ESM) in determining carbon-cycle climate feedback and the future climate. It describes the method of the study that analyzes the paleoclimate experiments proposed by the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project. It notes the result of the study, which shows that the complexity of the model requires various steps to correctly configure the experiments.

Climate regulates fire activity through the buildup and drying of fuels and the conditions for fire ignition and spread. Understanding the dynamics of contemporary climate-fire relationships at national and sub-national scales is critical to assess the likelihood of changes in future fire activity and the potential options for mitigation and adaptation. Here, we conducted the first national assessment of climate controls on US fire activity using two satellite-based estimates of monthly burned area (BA), the Global Fire Emissions Database (GFED, 1997-2010) and Monitoring Trends in Burn Severity (MTBS, 1984-2009) BA products. For each US National Climate Assessment (NCA) region, we analyzed the relationships between monthly BA and potential evaporation (PE) derived from reanalysis climate data at 0.5° resolution. US fire activity increased over the past 25 yr, with statistically significant increases in MTBS BA for entire US and the Southeast and Southwest NCA regions. Monthly PE was strongly correlated with US fire activity, yet the climate driver of PE varied regionally. Fire season temperature and shortwave radiation were the primary controls on PE and fire activity in the Alaska, while water deficit (precipitation - PE) was strongly correlated with fire activity in the Plains regions and Northwest US. BA and precipitation anomalies were negatively correlated in all regions, although fuel-limited ecosystems in the Southern Plains and Southwest exhibited positive correlations with longer lead times (6-12 months). Fire season PE in- creased from the 1980s-2000s, enhancing climate-driven fire risk in the southern and western US where PE-BA correlations were strongest. Spatial and temporal patterns of increasing fire season PE and BA during the 1990s-2000s highlight the potential sensitivity of US fire activity to climate change in coming decades. However, climate-fire relationships at the national scale are complex, based on the diversity of fire types, ecosystems, and ignition sources within each NCA region. Changes in the seasonality or magnitude of climate anomalies are therefore unlikely to result in uniform changes in US fire activity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over 2000km of Western Australian coastline experienced a significant marine heat wave in February and March 2011. Seawater temperature anomalies of +2-4 °C were recorded at a number of locations and satellite-derived SSTs were the highest on record. Here, we present seawater temperatures from southwestern Australia and describe, in detail, the marine climatology of Cockburn Sound; a large, multiple-use coastal embayment. We compared temperature and dissolved oxygen levels in 2011 with data from routine monitoring conducted from 2002-2010. A significant warming event, 2-4 °C in magnitude, persisted for >8 weeks, and seawater temperatures at 10 to 20m depth were significantly higher than those recorded in the previous 9 yr. Dissolved oxygen levels were depressed at most monitoring sites, being †2mgl-1 lower than usual in early March 2011. Ecological responses to short-term extreme events are poorly understood, but evidence from elsewhere along the Western Australian coastline suggests that the heat wave was associated with high rates of coral bleaching, fish, invertebrate and macroalgae mortalities, and algal blooms. However, more ecological information from Cockburn Sound and other multiple-use embayments is urgently needed. The 2011 heat wave provided insights into conditions that may become more prevalent in Cockburn Sound, and elsewhere, if the intensity and frequency of short-term extreme events increases as predicted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The French program Coriolis as part of the French oceanographic operational system produces the COriolis dataset for Re-Analysis (CORA) on a yearly basis which is based on temperature and salinity measurements on observed levels from different data types. The latest release of CORA covers the period 1990 to 2010. To qualify this dataset, several tests have been developed to improve in a homogeneous way the quality of the raw dataset and to fit the level required by the physical ocean re-analysis activities (assimilation and validation). These include some simple tests, climatological tests and a model background check based on a global ocean reanalysis. Visual qual ity control (QC) is performed on all suspicious temperature (T ) and salinity (S) profiles identified by the tests and quality flags are modified in the dataset if necessary. In addition, improved diagnostic tools were developed - including global ocean indicators - which give information on the potential and quality of the CORA dataset for all applications. This Coriolis product is available on request through the MyOcean Service Desk (http://www.myocean.eu/). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents a study on volcanic eruptions' impacts on biogeochemistry and climate in a coupled carbon-climate model. The study compared Community Climate System Model Version 3 (CCSM3) with direct observations of Mount Pinatubo eruption in 1991. It notes that the test could be conducted with no control simulation in instances where running separate ensembles without and with volcanic eruptions was not practical.

The article presents a study which explores the significance of radio occultation (RO) in profiling the Earth's atmosphere. The theoritical probabilities of RO have been highlighted which provides accurate profiles of electron density in the ionosphere and refractivity in the stratosphere and troposphere. The RO missions as well as its applications are summarized.

We introduce and document the first version of the Centre National de Recherches Météorologiques Earth system model (CNRM-ESM1). This model is based on the physical core of the CNRM-CM5 model and employs the Interactions between Soil, Bio-sphere and Atmosphere (ISBA) module and the Pelagic Interaction Scheme for Carbon and Ecosystem Studies (PISCES) as terrestrial and oceanic components of the global carbon cycle. We describe a preindustrial and 20th century climate simulation following the CMIP5 protocol. We detail how the various carbon reservoirs were initialized and analyze the behavior of the carbon cycle and its prominent physical drivers. CNRM-ESM1 reproduces satisfactorily several aspects of the modern carbon cycle. On land, the model reasonably captures the carbon cycling through vegetation and soil, resulting in a net terrestrial carbon sink of 2.2 PgCy-1. In the ocean, the large-scale distribution of hydrodynamical and biogeochemical tracers agrees well with a modern climatology from the World Ocean Atlas. The combination of biological and physical processes induces a net CO2 uptake of 1.7 PgCy-1 that falls within the range of recent estimates. Our analysis shows that the atmospheric climate of CNRM-ESM1 compares well with that of CNRM-CM5. Biases in precipitation and shortwave radiation over the Tropics generate errors in gross primary productivity and ecosystem respiration. Compared to CNRM-CM5, the revised ocean-sea ice coupling has modified the sea-ice cover and ocean ventilation, unrealistically strengthening the flow of North Atlantic deep water (26.1±2 Sv). It results in an accumulation of anthropogenic carbon in the deep ocean. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Lake Ohrid (Macedonia/Albania) is a rare example of a deep, ancient Mediterranean lake and is a key site for palaeoclimate research in the northeastern Mediterranean region. This study conducts the first high-resolution diatom analysis during the Lateglacial and Holocene in Lake Ohrid. It demonstrates a complex diatom response to temperature change, with a direct response to temperature-induced productivity and an indirect response to temperature-related stratification/mixing regime and epilimnetic nutrient availability. During the Lateglacial (ca. 12 300-11 800 cal yr BP), the low-diversity dominance of hypolimnetic Cyclotella fottii indicates low temperature-dependent lake productivity. During the earliest Holocene (ca. 11 800-10 600 cal yr BP), although the slight increase in small, epilimnetic C. minuscula suggests climate warming and enhanced thermal stratification, diatom concentration remains very low as during the Lateglacial, indicating that temperature increase was muted. The early Holocene (ca. 10 600- 8200 cal yr BP) marked a sustained increase in epilimnetic taxa, with mesotrophic C. ocellata indicating high temperature-induced lake productivity between ca. 10 600- 10 200 cal yr BP and between ca. 9500-8200 cal yr BP, and with C. minuscula in response to low nutrient availability in the epilimnion between ca. 10 200-9500 cal yr BP. During the mid Holocene (ca. 8200-2600 cal yr BP), when sedimentological and geochemical proxies provide evidence for high temperature, anomalously low C. ocellata abundance is probably a response to epilimnetic nutrient limitation, almost mimicking the Lateglacial flora apart from mesotrophic Stephanodiscus transylvanicus indicative of high temperature-induced productivity in the hypolimnion. During the late Holocene (ca. 2600-0 cal yr BP), high abundance and fluctuating composition of epilimnetic taxa is largely a response to enhanced anthropogenic nutrient input. In this deep, oligotrophic lake, this study demonstrates the strong influence of lake physical and chemical processes in mediating the complex response of diatoms to climate change with particular respect to temperature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]