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The frequency of extratropical cyclones in East Asia, including those traveling along the Kuroshio off the south coast of Japan, maximizes climatologically in spring in harmony with local enhancement of precipitation. The springtime cyclone activity is of great socioeconomic importance for East Asian countries. However, mechanisms for the spring peak in the East Asian cyclone activity have been poorly understood. This study aims to unravel the mechanisms, focusing particularly on favorable conditions for relevant cyclogenesis. Through a composite analysis based on atmospheric reanalysis data, we show that cyclogenesis enhanced around the East China Sea under anomalously strengthened cyclonic wind shear and temperature gradient, in addition to enhanced moisture flux from the south, is important for the spring peak in the cyclone activity in East Asia. In spring, climatologically strengthened cyclonic shear north of the low-level jet axis and associated frequent atmospheric frontogenesis in southern China and the East China Sea serve as favorable background conditions for low-level cyclogenesis. We also demonstrate that climatologically enhanced diabatic heating around East Asia is pivotal in strengthening of the low-level jet through a set of linear baroclinic model experiments. Our findings suggest the importance of the seasonal evolution of diabatic heating in East Asia for that of the climate system around East Asia from winter to spring, encompassing the spring peak in the cyclone activity and climatological precipitation., Comment: 30 pages, 12 figures

We study a liquid-gas coexistence system in a container under gravity with heat flow in the direction opposite to gravity. By molecular dynamics simulation, we find that the liquid buoys up and continues to float steadily. The height at which the liquid floats is determined by a dimensionless parameter related to the ratio of the temperature gradient to gravity. We confirm that supercooled gas remains stable above the liquid. We provide a phenomenological argument for explaining the phenomenon from a simple thermodynamic assumption., Comment: 5 pages + supplementary material

For small thermodynamic systems in contact with a heat bath, we determine the free energy by imposing the following two conditions. First, the quasi-static work in any configuration change is equal to the free energy difference. Second, the temperature dependence of the free energy satisfies the Gibbs-Helmholtz relation. We find that these prerequisites uniquely lead to the free energy of a classical system consisting of $N$-interacting identical particles, up to an additive constant proportional to $N$. The free energy thus determined contains the Gibbs factorial $N!$ in addition to the phase space integration of the Gibbs-Boltzmann factor. The key step in the derivation is to construct a quasi-static decomposition of small thermodynamic systems., Comment: 11 pages, 2 figures

In thermodynamically characterizing a mixture comprising a finite number of molecules, we consider two kinds of protocol for producing a mixture from a pure substance. The first is a single alchemical operation, whereas the second is a series of processes with feedback control in information thermodynamics and conventional mixing with semipermeable membranes. A comparison of the two numerically determined free-energy changes provides a combinatorial factor that indicates the indistinguishability of the molecules and an alternative Jarzynski equality. The comparison also uncovers a work relation for determining the mixing free energy without using semipermeable membranes. We demonstrate a numerical calculation of applying the work relation to a mixture of argon and krypton. The mixing free energy clearly shows the characteristics of liquid--vapor transition., Comment: 17 pages, 14figures