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Biases and improvements of the ENSO-East Asian winter monsoon teleconnection in CMIP5 and CMIP6 models

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Abstract

The influence of El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO) on the East Asian winter monsoon (EAWM) is investigated based on the outputs of phase 6 of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (CMIP6) models and compared to that in phase 5 (CMIP5). Results show that overall the CMIP6 models reproduce the ENSO-EAWM teleconnection more realistically than the CMIP5 models, although they still somewhat underestimate the ENSO-EAWM teleconnection than observed. Based on the intermodel spread of ENSO-EAWM teleconnection simulated in the CMIP5/CMIP6 models, we reveal that the commonly underestimated ENSO-EAWM teleconnection among the models can be traced back to the excessive extension of the cold tongue to the equatorial western Pacific. A model with a stronger climatological cold tongue favors generating a more westward extension of the ENSO-related SST anomaly pattern, which in turn forces an anomalous cyclonic circulation over the Northwest Pacific (NWP). It offsets the anticyclonic anomalies in the NWP and weakens the ENSO-EAWM teleconnection. Compared with the CMIP5 models, most CMIP6 models better simulate SST mean state and the resultant ENSO-EAWM teleconnection. The present results suggest that substantial efforts should be made to reduce the bias in the mean-state SST for further improving the simulation and projection of the East Asian-western Pacific winter climate.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (42005022, 41975116, 91937302, 41721004 and 42075033), the Natural science foundation of Jiangsu Province (BK20200532), the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (B210202139), and the Postdoctoral Science Foundation of Zhejiang Province (ZJ2020164). The observed SST data used during this study are openly available from the Extended Reconstructed SST, version 3 (ERSST. v3) dataset at https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/data/gridded/data.noaa.ersst.html as cited in Smith et al. (2008). And the monthly mean wind and precipitation are from the National Centers for Environment Prediction-National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCEP/NCAR) reanalysis dataset with a horizontal resolution of 2.5°×2.5°, covering the period from 1961 to 2010 (Kalnay et al. 1996) (available at https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/data/gridded/data.ncep.reanalysis.html). The CMIP5 model datasets are available at https://esgf-node.llnl.gov/search/cmip5/. And the CMIP6 model datasets are publicly available at https://esgf-node.llnl.gov/search/cmip6/.

Funding

This research is supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (42005022, 41975116, 91937302, 41721004 and 42075033), the Natural science foundation of Jiangsu Province (BK20200532), the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (B210202139), and the Postdoctoral Science Foundation of Zhejiang Province (ZJ2020164).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Key Laboratory of Marine Hazards Forecasting, Ministry of Natural Resources/College of Oceanography, Hohai University, Nanjing, China

    Wenping Jiang

  2. State Key Laboratory of Numerical Modeling for Atmospheric Sciences and Geophysical Fluid Dynamics, Institute of Atmospheric Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China

    Ping Huang & Gang Huang

  3. Center for Monsoon System Research, Institute of Atmospheric Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China

    Hainan Gong, Ping Huang, Lin Wang & Gang Huang

  4. State Key Laboratory of Satellite Ocean Environment Dynamics, Second Institute of Oceanography, Ministry of Natural Resources, Hangzhou, China

    Lisuo Hu

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  1. Wenping Jiang
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  4. Lin Wang
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  5. Gang Huang
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All authors contributed to the concept and design of the research. WJ did the analysis and prepared the draft. HG, PH, LW, GH and LH acquired the funding and supervised the research. All authors contributed to the revising and editing of the paper.

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Correspondence to Wenping Jiang.

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Jiang, W., Gong, H., Huang, P. et al. Biases and improvements of the ENSO-East Asian winter monsoon teleconnection in CMIP5 and CMIP6 models. Clim Dyn 59, 2467–2480 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00382-022-06220-5

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