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A comparison of East Asian summer monsoon simulations from CAM3.1 with three dynamic cores

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Abstract

This paper examines the sensitivity of CAM3.1 simulations of East Asian summer monsoon (EASM) to the choice of dynamic cores using three long-term simulations, one with each of the following cores: the Eulerian spectral transform method (EUL), semi-Lagrangian scheme (SLD) and finite volume approach (FV). Our results indicate that the dynamic cores significantly influence the simulated fields not only through dynamics, such as wind, but also through physical processes, such as precipitation. Generally speaking, SLD is superior to EUL and FV in simulating the climatological features of EASM and its interannual variability. The SLD version of the CAM model partially reduces its known deficiency in simulating the climatological features of East Asian summer precipitation. The strength and position of simulated western Pacific subtropical high (WPSH) and its ridge line compare more favourably with observations in SLD and FV than in EUL. They contribute to the intensification of the south-easterly along the south of WPSH and the vertical motion through the troposphere around 30° N, where the subtropical rain belt exists. Additionally, SLD simulates the scope of the westerly jet core over East Asia more realistically than the other two dynamic cores do. Considerable systematic errors of the seasonal migration of monsoon rain belt and water vapour flux exist in all of the three versions of CAM3.1 model, although it captures the broad northward shift of convection, and the simulated results share similarities. The interannual variation of EASM is found to be more accurate in SLD simulation, which reasonably reproduces the leading combined patterns of precipitation and 850-hPa winds in East Asia, as well as the 2.5- and 10-year periods of Li–Zeng EASM index. These results emphasise the importance of dynamic cores for the EASM simulation as distinct from the simulation’s sensitivity to the physical parameterisations.

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Acknowledgments

The simulations were performed at the GCESS high performance centre at BNU. This work was supported by the National Basic Research Program of China under Grant No. 2010CB950500.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Atmospheric Sciences, Lanzhou University, Lanzhou, 730000, China

    Ting Wei

  2. College of Global Change and Earth System Science, Beijing Normal University, Beijing, 100875, China

    Ting Wei, Lanning Wang & Wenjie Dong

  3. State Key Laboratory for Earth Surface Processes and Resource Ecology, Beijing Normal University, Beijing, 100875, China

    Wenjie Dong

  4. China National Climate Center, China Meteorological Administration, Beijing, 100081, China

    Min Dong

  5. Institute of Atmospheric Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100029, China

    Jingyong Zhang

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  1. Ting Wei
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Correspondence to Wenjie Dong.

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Wei, T., Wang, L., Dong, W. et al. A comparison of East Asian summer monsoon simulations from CAM3.1 with three dynamic cores. Theor Appl Climatol 106, 295–306 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00704-011-0409-9

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