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Theories for Past and Future Monsoon Rainfall Changes

  • Climate Change and Atmospheric Circulation (R Chadwick, Section Editor)
  • Published:
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Abstract

Purpose of Review

Long-standing biases in simulations of past and present climate states and climate model disagreement even in sign of future monsoon rainfall changes evince limitations in our theoretical understanding.

Recent Findings

The dominant theoretical paradigms for understanding monsoon rainfall—convective-quasi equilibrium (CQE), the moist static energy (MSE) budget, and monsoons as local Intertropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ) shifts—all jettison the traditional “land-sea breeze” paradigm. Summer monsoon precipitation falls when the assumptions of CQE are most satisfied but those of the ITCZ shift framework are least satisfied. Zonal asymmetries, changes in ITCZ width and strength, hydrology-vegetation-CO2 coupling, and timescale-dependent responses complicate inferences of monsoon rainfall from paleoclimate proxy records. The MSE budget framework applied to deliberately designed simulations can illuminate key mechanisms underlying monsoon responses to external forcings, presenting a path toward falsifying model projections.

Summary

Sustained, rapid progress in monsoon rainfall theory is urgently needed by society and is plausible based on recent advances.

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Acknowledgments

I thank Yi Ming, Simona Bordoni, Jonathan Mitchell, Isaac Held, Ming Zhao, Natalie Burls, Martin Singh, Dargan Frierson, Bill Boos, Sarah Kang, Alex Gonzalez, Sean Faulk, David Neelin, Tim Merlis, Ho-Hsuan Wei, and Jack Scheff for conversations that have shaped my thinking on these topics. I also thank Michael Byrne and an anonymous reviewer for insightful reviews of the manuscript.

Funding

This work was supported by a Caltech Foster and Coco Stanback Postdoctoral Fellowship.

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  1. Division of Geological and Planetary Sciences, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA

    Spencer A. Hill

  2. Department of Earth, Planetary, and Space Sciences, UCLA, Los Angeles, CA, USA

    Spencer A. Hill

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Hill, S.A. Theories for Past and Future Monsoon Rainfall Changes. Curr Clim Change Rep 5, 160–171 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40641-019-00137-8

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