Abstract
The variability of air temperature extremes exerts a great influence on agricultural production and the global hydrologic cycle. It has been the focus of attention for the past several decades. Using observed surface air temperature from 192 meteorological stations in South China maintained by the China Meteorological Administration, this study computed and analyzed 10 extreme temperature indices and the mean temperature at multiple spatiotemporal scales for the period from 1961 to 2018. These indices were analyzed with particular reference to the growing season of rice. Results showed that the variation trends of all annual indices exhibited different north–south patterns across decades, and the most recent 20-year period experienced greater warming than previous periods. The regional averaged rates of the annual mean maximum temperature, the annual mean minimum temperature, summer days, and tropical nights were 0.163 °C decade−1, 0.197 °C decade−1, 1.2 days decade−1, and 5.4 days decade−1, respectively. Except for the month of April, the southern region mostly experienced stronger warming than the northern region, especially in summer and autumn. Nighttime warming was usually greater than daytime warming, especially in June and October. Most temperature indices showed very weak correlations with large-scale atmospheric oscillations.
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Acknowledgements
We would like to thank the China Meteorological Administration (CMA) for providing the meteorological data.
Funding
This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (grant number 42005142, 41605118) and the Key Science and Technology Planning Project of Guangdong Province (grant number 2019B020214003).
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Leidi Wang and Fei Hu analyzed the data and wrote the paper. Jing Hu and Chen Chen assisted in data processing and analysis and interpreted the results. Xian Liu and Dingling Zhang assisted in drawing and writing the original draft. Tingting Chen and Yuchen Miao participated in data curation and validation. Lei Zhang designed the study and participated in writing-editing.
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Wang, L., Hu, F., Hu, J. et al. Multistage spatiotemporal variability of temperature extremes over South China from 1961 to 2018. Theor Appl Climatol 146, 243–256 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00704-021-03728-4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00704-021-03728-4