Anita Drumond

A Lagrangian identification of major sources of moisture over Central Brazil and La Plata Basin

[1] This work examines the main sources of moisture over Central Brazil and La Plata Basin during the year through a new Lagrangian diagnosis method which identifies the humidity contributions to the moisture budget over a region. This methodology computes budgets of evaporation minus precipitation by calculating changes in the specific humidity along back-trajectories for the previous 10 d. The origin of all air masses residing over each region was tracked during a period of 5 years (2000–2004). These regions were selected because they coincide with two centers of action of a known dipole precipitation variability mode observed in different temporal scales (from intra seasonal up to inter decadal timescales) and are related to the climatic variability of the South American Monsoon System. The results suggested the importance of the tropical south Atlantic as a moisture source for Central Brazil, and of recycling for La Plata basin. It seems that the Tropical South Atlantic plays an important role as a moisture source for Central Brazil and La Plata basin along the year, particularly during the austral summer. The north Atlantic is also an additional source for both regions during the austral summer.

The role of the ENSO cycle in the modulation of moisture transport from major oceanic moisture sources

The influence that the evolution of the ENSO cycle has on the moisture transport from the major oceanic moisture sources is investigated using a sophisticated Lagrangian approach informed by ERA-interim data, together with composites of ENSO phases. When maintaining the sources of moisture defined for the climatological period 1980–2012, the variations in the moisture sinks associated with each of these evaporative sources throughout the ENSO cycle reproduce the known patterns of variations of the large-scale atmospheric and precipitation systems over this cycle. Such variations include those observed in rainfall over the equatorial Pacific, in the major Summer monsoon systems, and in subtropical rainfall. When the areas of the sources were redefined according to the phase of ENSO, most of them remained stationary over the period of interest, nevertheless four of them showed notable differences in terms of their extents, namely the South Pacific and the Coral Sea (Pacific Ocean); the Mexican Caribbean (Atlantic), and the Arabian Sea (Indian).

A Lagrangian identification of the main sources of moisture affecting northeastern Brazil during its pre-rainy and rainy seasons.

This work examines the sources of moisture affecting the semi-arid Brazilian Northeast (NEB) during its pre-rainy and rainy season (JFMAM) through a Lagrangian diagnosis method. The FLEXPART model identifies the humidity contributions to the moisture budget over a region through the continuous computation of changes in the specific humidity along back or forward trajectories up to 10 days period. The numerical experiments were done for the period that spans between 2000 and 2004 and results were aggregated on a monthly basis. Results show that besides a minor local recycling component, the vast majority of moisture reaching NEB area is originated in the south Atlantic basin and that the nearby wet Amazon basin bears almost no impact. Moreover, although the maximum precipitation in the “Poligono das Secas” region (PS) occurs in March and the maximum precipitation associated with air parcels emanating from the South Atlantic towards PS is observed along January to March, the highest moisture contribution from this oceanic region occurs slightly later (April). A dynamical analysis suggests that the maximum precipitation observed in the PS sector does not coincide with the maximum moisture supply probably due to the combined effect of the Walker and Hadley cells in inhibiting the rising motions over the region in the months following April.

A catalog of moisture sources for continental climatic regions

This technical note describes a catalog of moisture sources for two sets of continental climatic regions: one based on regions with similar late 20th century mean climate and similar projected late 21st century precipitation changes, and the other widely used in IPCC assessment reports. By illustrating with one region by classification, the European one was selected and we identify and characterize all the major sources of moisture, and analyze their interannual variability and the role of the three dominant modes of global climate variability, including the El Nino-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and the Northern and Southern Annular Modes (NAM, SAM). We also estimate the influence of those oceanic regions that will see the greatest increases in evaporation rate in future years.

Moisture transport into the Arctic: Source-receptor relationships and the roles of atmospheric circulation and evaporation

Hydrological processes play a key role in the Arctic, as well as being an important part of the response of this region to climate change. The origin of the moisture arriving (and then precipitating) in the Arctic is a crucial question in our understanding of the Arctic hydrological cycle. In an attempt to answer this, the present study uses the Lagrangian diagnosis model FLEXPART (FLEXible PARTicle dispersion model) to localize the main sources of moisture for the Arctic region, to analyze their variability and their contribution to precipitation, and to consider the implications of any changes in the transport of moisture from particular sources within the system. From this analysis, four major moisture sources appear as the most important moisture supplies into the system: the subtropical and southern extratropical Pacific and Atlantic Oceans, North America, and Siberia. Oceanic sources play an important role throughout the year, whereas continental ones only take effect in summer. The sink areas associated with each source have been shown to be moderately influenced by changes in atmospheric circulation, mainly associated with the East Atlantic pattern for the Atlantic source and related to West Pacific and Pacific/North American (PNA) teleconnection patterns for the Pacific one. On the other hand, the variability over the sinks does not seem to be significantly related to changes in evaporation at an interannual scale.

Estimating the temporal domain when the discount of the net evaporation term affects the resulting net precipitation pattern in the moisture budget using a 3-D Lagrangian approach.

The Lagrangian FLEXPART model has been used during the last decade to detect moisture sources that affect the climate in different regions of the world. While most of these studies provided a climatological perspective on the atmospheric branch of the hydrological cycle in terms of precipitation, none assessed the minimum temporal domain for which the climatological approach is valid. The methodology identifies the contribution of humidity to the moisture budget in a region by computing the changes in specific humidity along backward (or forward) trajectories of air masses over a period of ten days beforehand (afterwards), thereby allowing the calculation of monthly, seasonal and annual averages. The current study calculates as an example the climatological seasonal mean and variance of the net precipitation for regions in which precipitation exceeds evaporation (E-P<0) for the North Atlantic moisture source region using different time periods, for winter and summer from 1980 to 2000. The results show that net evaporation (E-P>0) can be discounted after when the integration of E-P is done without affecting the general net precipitation patterns when it is discounted in a monthly or longer time scale.

A Lagrangian perspective of the hydrological cycle in the Congo River basin

The Lagrangian model FLEXPART is used to identify the moisture sources of the Congo River basin (CRB) and investigate their role in the hydrological cycle. This model allows us to track atmospheric parcels while calculating changes in the specific humidity through the budget of evaporation minus precipitation. This method permits the annual-scale identification of five continental and four oceanic principal regions that provide moisture to the CRB from both hemispheres over the course of the year. The most important is the CRB, which provides more than 50 % of the total atmospheric moisture contribution to precipitation over itself. Additionally, both the land that extends to the east of the CRB and the eastern equatorial South Atlantic Ocean are very important sources, while the Red Sea source is merely important in the (E−P ) budget over the CRB despite its high evaporation rate. The moisture-sink patterns over the CRB in air masses that were tracked forward in time from all the sources follow the latitudinal rainfall migration and are mostly highly correlated with the pattern of the precipitation rate, ensuring a link between them. In wet (dry) years, the contribution of moisture to precipitation from the CRB over itself increases (decreases). Despite the enhanced evaporative conditions over the basin during dry years, the vertically integrated moisture flux (VIMF) divergence inhibits precipitation and suggests the transport of moisture from the CRB to remote regions.

The modulation of oceanic moisture transport by the hemispheric annular modes

Leaving aside the contribution made by recycling, it is the main oceanic moisture sources that are responsible for most of the precipitation that falls on the continents. The transport of moisture from these sources can be affected by large-scale variability according to the hemispheric annular modes. The influence of the two dominant modes of extratropical winter climate: the Northern and the Southern Annular Modes (NAM and SAM) are herein investigated to assess how they affect the transport of moisture from the major oceanic moisture sources. A Lagrangian model was used, together with ERA-Interim reanalysis data (1979-2012), and differences between the composites of the six strongest higher and lower events observed for both phases of the two modes for the period were analysed. The method is able to reproduce the general pattern of known variations for both annular patterns. Lower values of the NAM Index are associated with the displacement of the storm track towards tropical latitudes. Thus, moisture transport is enhanced from the Northern Pacific towards the northeastern basin and from the Northern Atlantic and Mediterranean towards southern Europe. On the other hand, during higher values of NAM, moisture transport is favoured from the Northern Pacific towards eastern Asia, and moisture transport is enhanced from the Northern Atlantic towards the Caribbean Sea. In the Southern Hemisphere, during higher values of SAM more moisture is transported from the Atlantic and Indian oceanic sources southwards and eastwards than during the opposite phase. In this SAM phase it is also noted by an enhancement of moisture transport from the Coral Sea and Southern Pacific sources towards the Indian Ocean/West Pacific Warm Pool. Southeastern South America received more moisture from the Pacific and Atlantic sources during years with a lower SAM, episodes which also favoured the influx of moisture from the Southern Atlantic towards Africa, causing monsoon conditions to occur.

Recent changes of relative humidity: regional connections with land and ocean processes

We analyzed changes in surface relative humidity (RH) at the global scale from 1979 to 2014 using both observations and the ERA-Interim dataset. We compared the variability and trends in RH with those of land evapotranspiration and ocean evaporation in moisture source areas across a range of selected regions worldwide. The sources of moisture for each particular region were identified by integrating different observational data and model outputs into a Lagrangian approach. The aim was to account for the possible role of changes in air temperature over land, in comparison to sea surface temperature (SST), but also the role of land evapotranspiration and the ocean evaporation on RH variability. The results demonstrate that the patterns of the observed trends in RH at the global scale cannot be linked to a particular individual physical mechanism. Our results also stress that the different hypotheses that may explain the decrease in RH under a global warming scenario could act together to explain recent RH trends. Albeit with uncertainty in establishing a direct causality between RH trends and the different empirical moisture sources, we found that the observed decrease in RH in some regions can be linked to lower water supply from land evapotranspiration. In contrast, the empirical relationships also suggest that RH trends in other target regions are mainly explained by the dynamic and thermodynamic mechanisms related to the moisture supply from the oceanic source regions. Overall, while this work gives insights into the connections between RH trends and oceanic and continental processes at the global scale, further investigation is still desired to assess the contribution of both dynamic and thermodynamic factors to the evolution of RH over continental regions.

Climatology and numerical case study of moisture sources associated with subtropical cyclogenesis over the southwestern Atlantic Ocean

An important feature during cyclogenesis is the availability of moisture to fuel the associated convective activity providing faster developments and more intense systems. In this work, an investigation of the role of local evaporation and remote water vapor transport prior to subtropical cyclogenesis in the Southwestern South Atlantic (named RG1 region) is presented. Results were obtained analyzing the period from 1980 to 2015 with a Lagrangian particle dispersion model together with the ERA-Interim reanalysis. The northern sector of the Subtropical High in the South Atlantic Ocean stands out as the main source region of water vapor to the RG1, with the low-level northeasterly winds being responsible by moisture transport. An anomalous moisture transport from lower latitudes preceded the subtropical cyclogenesis events and provided the necessary water vapor to fuel the convective activity. A numerical case study using the Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) mesoscale model indicated that the remote moisture source is essential for subtropical cyclogenesis in RG1, since it allows a stronger surface low pressure to develop and supports the formation of a cut-off low in the middle troposphere. Though the local evaporation has a secondary role in this process, it helped the system to attain the observed intensity and subtropical characteristics. Therefore, both local and remote moisture sources provide the incipient subtropical cyclone with the horizontal temperature advection and convective activity necessary to its further development.