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Influence of the May Southern annular mode on the South China Sea summer monsoon

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Abstract

The possible impact of the May Southern Hemisphere (SH) annular mode (SAM) on the following South China Sea (SCS) summer monsoon (SCSSM) is examined. A close inverse relationship between the two is revealed in the observations. The simultaneous South Pacific dipole (SPD), a dipole-like sea surface temperature anomaly pattern in the South Pacific, acts as the “oceanic bridge” to preserve the May SAM signal and prolong it into June–September. Observational evidence and numerical simulations both demonstrate that the SPD communicates its large thermal inertia signal to the atmosphere, regulating the Southern Pacific Subtropical Jet (SPSJ) variability over eastern Australia. Corresponding to the adjustment of circulation associated with the SPSJ is a prominent tripolar cross-Pacific teleconnection pattern stretching from the SH middle–high latitudes into the NH East Asia coastal region, referred to as the South–North Pacific (SNP) teleconnection pattern. Wave ray tracing analysis manifests that the SNP acts as the “atmospheric bridge” to propagate the related wave energy across the equator and into the Maritime Continent and SCS monsoon region, modulating the vertical motion and middle–lower tropospheric flows, and favoring the out-of-phase variation of the SCSSM. Therefore, the “coupled oceanic-atmospheric bridge” process and the related Rossby wave energy transmission are possible mechanisms for the significant influence of the May SAM on the variability of the following SCSSM. Therefore, the May SAM provides a fresh insight into the prediction of the SCSSM from the perspective of the SH high latitudes.

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Acknowledgements

This study was jointly supported by the 973 Program (2013CB430200) and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (41575060, 41690124 and 41690120). The authors are grateful to the valuable comments and suggestions of the two anonymous reviewers, which have helped us to improve the paper.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Laboratory of Satellite Ocean Environment Dynamics, Second Institute of Oceanography, Hangzhou, China

    Ting Liu, Jiayu Zheng & Zhixiong Yao

  2. State Key Laboratory of Earth Surface Processes and Resource Ecology and College of Global Change and Earth System Science, Beijing Normal University, Beijing, 100875, China

    Jianping Li

  3. Laboratory for Regional Oceanography and Numerical Modeling, Qingdao National Laboratory for Marine Science and Technology, Qingdao, 266237, China

    Jianping Li

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

    YanJie Li & Fei Zheng

  5. School of Ocean and Earth Science and Technology, University of Hawaii at Mānoa, Honolulu, HI, USA

    Sen Zhao

  6. Key Laboratory of Meteorological Disaster of Ministry of Education, and College of Atmospheric Science, Nanjing University of Information Science and Technology, Nanjing, China

    Sen Zhao

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  1. Ting Liu
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  2. Jianping Li
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  3. YanJie Li
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Correspondence to Jianping Li or YanJie Li.

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This paper is a contribution to the special issue on East Asian Climate under Global Warming: Understanding and Projection, consisting of papers from the East Asian Climate (EAC) community and the 13th EAC International Workshop in Beijing, China on 24–25 March 2016, and coordinated by Jianping Li, Huang-Hsiung Hsu, Wei-Chyung Wang, Kyung-Ja Ha, Tim Li, and Akio Kitoh.

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Liu, T., Li, J., Li, Y. et al. Influence of the May Southern annular mode on the South China Sea summer monsoon. Clim Dyn 51, 4095–4107 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00382-017-3753-3

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