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Characteristics of diurnal condensational heating at the Western Maritime Continent during MJO eastward propagation

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Abstract

The Maritime Continent (MC) is a unique region with a pronounced diurnal cycle and the strong impact of the Madden–Julian Oscillation (MJO). How and to what extent eastward propagating MJOs influence the diurnal cycle of the condensational heating at the Western Maritime Continent (WMC) during boreal winter is investigated with observational and re-analysis data. The diurnal heating field shows distinctive vertical profiles and peak time in the land and the surrounding ocean, with the former (latter) peaking in the lower troposphere near 700 hPa and in the early morning (near the surface and in the late afternoon). The diurnal condensational heating at WMC is enhanced when MJO is locates in the Indian Ocean (IO) and weakened when MJO moves to MC and Western Pacific (WP). Through the diagnosis of the moisture equation, it is found that the MJO-dependent change of the diurnal heating is predominantly contributed by anomalous vertical advection of the background moisture by the diurnal vertical velocity field. The amplitude of the diurnal vertical velocity field is significantly strengthened (weakened) when MJO is located at IO (MC and WP), due to the fact that MJO exhibits a tilted vertical structure with increased low-level moisture in front of MJO convection. It is the MJO induced background moisture increase that favors the strengthening of the diurnal cycle activity through moisture-convection-circulation feedback.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (42088101), the Natural Science Foundation of Jiangsu Higher Education Institutions of China (22KJB170006). The authors acknowledge the High Performance Computing Center of Nanjing University of Information Science & Technology for their support of this work.

Funding

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (42088101), the Natural Science Foundation of Jiangsu Higher Education Institutions of China (22KJB170006), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (42175069).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Key Laboratory of Meteorological Disaster, Ministry of Education (KLME), Joint International Research Laboratory of Climate and Environmental Change (ILCEC), Collaborative Innovation Center On Forecast and Evaluation of Meteorological Disasters (CIC-FEMD), Nanjing University of Information Science and Technology, Nanjing, China

    Yan Zhu & Tim Li

  2. International Pacific Research Center and Department of Atmospheric Sciences, School of Ocean and Earth Science and Technology, University of Hawaii, Honolulu, HI, USA

    Tim Li

Authors
  1. Yan Zhu
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  2. Tim Li
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Both authors contributed to the study conception and design. The manuscript was written by YZ and both authors revised the manuscript. Both authors read and approved the final manuscript.

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Correspondence to Yan Zhu.

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Zhu, Y., Li, T. Characteristics of diurnal condensational heating at the Western Maritime Continent during MJO eastward propagation. Clim Dyn 61, 3775–3786 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00382-023-06761-3

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