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Title: Vertical structure and physical processes of the Madden-Julian oscillation: Linking hindcast fidelity to simulated diabatic heating and moistening

Journal Article · · Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1002/2014JD022374· OSTI ID:1410067
ORCiD logo [1];  [1];  [2];  [2];  [3];  [3];  [4];  [5];  [6];  [7];  [8];  [9];  [10];  [11];  [12];  [13];  [14];  [15];  [16];  [17] more »;  [3];  [16] « less
  1. Univ. of Reading, Reading (United Kingdom)
  2. Univ. of California, Los Angeles, CA (United States); Jet Propulsion Lab., Pasadena, CA (United States)
  3. UK Met Office, Exeter (United Kingdom)
  4. Swedish Meteorological and Hydrological Institute, Norrkoping (Sweden)
  5. National Center for Atmospheric Research, Boulder, CO (United States)
  6. Univ. of Washington, Seattle, WA (United States)
  7. Lawrence Livermore National Lab. (LLNL), Livermore, CA (United States)
  8. Canadian Centre for Climate Modelling and Analysis, Environment Canada, Victoria, BC (Canada)
  9. Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology, Yokosuka (Japan); Tokyo Univ., Tokyo (Japan)
  10. Univ. of California, Irvine, CA (United States)
  11. Naval Research Lab., Monterey, CA (United States)
  12. CNRM-GAME, Toulouse (France)
  13. Meteorological Research Institute, Tsukuba (Japan)
  14. European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts, Reading (United Kingdom)
  15. NASA Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC), Greenbelt, MD (United States)
  16. Scripps Institution of Oceanography, La Jolla, CA (United States)
  17. Univ. of Miami, Coral Gables, FL (United States)
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Here, many theories for the Madden-Julian oscillation (MJO) focus on diabatic processes, particularly the evolution of vertical heating and moistening. Poor MJO performance in weather and climate models is often blamed on biases in these processes and their interactions with the large-scale circulation. We introduce one of the three components of a model evaluation project, which aims to connect MJO fidelity in models to their representations of several physical processes, focusing on diabatic heating and moistening. This component consists of 20 day hindcasts, initialized daily during two MJO events in winter 2009–2010. The 13 models exhibit a range of skill: several have accurate forecasts to 20 days lead, while others perform similarly to statistical models (8–11 days). Models that maintain the observed MJO amplitude accurately predict propagation, but not vice versa. We find no link between hindcast fidelity and the precipitation-moisture relationship, in contrast to other recent studies. There is also no relationship between models' performance and the evolution of their diabatic heating profiles with rain rate. A more robust association emerges between models' fidelity and net moistening: the highest-skill models show a clear transition from low-level moistening for light rainfall to midlevel moistening at moderate rainfall and upper level moistening for heavy rainfall. The midlevel moistening, arising from both dynamics and physics, may be most important. Accurately representing many processes may be necessary but not sufficient for capturing the MJO, which suggests that models fail to predict the MJO for a broad range of reasons and limits the possibility of finding a panacea.

Research Organization:
Lawrence Livermore National Lab. (LLNL), Livermore, CA (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE
Grant/Contract Number:
AC52-07NA27344
OSTI ID:
1410067
Report Number(s):
LLNL-JRNL-741126
Journal Information:
Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres, Vol. 120, Issue 10; ISSN 2169-897X
Publisher:
American Geophysical UnionCopyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Citation Metrics:
Cited by: 46 works
Citation information provided by
Web of Science

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Cited By (7)

Roles of deep and shallow convection and microphysics in the MJO simulated by the Model for Prediction Across Scales: DEEP AND SHALLOW CONVECTION IN THE MJO journal September 2016
MJO simulation in CMIP5 climate models: MJO skill metrics and process-oriented diagnosis journal March 2017
Validity of parameter optimization in improving MJO simulation and prediction using the sub-seasonal to seasonal forecast model of Beijing Climate Center journal July 2018
Prediction and predictability of tropical intraseasonal convection: seasonal dependence and the Maritime Continent prediction barrier journal October 2018
Contemporary GCM Fidelity in Representing the Diurnal Cycle of Precipitation Over the Maritime Continent journal January 2019
MJO Propagation Processes and Mean Biases in the SubX and S2S Reforecasts journal August 2019
Climate SPHINX: evaluating the impact of resolution and stochastic physics parameterisations in the EC-Earth global climate model journal January 2017

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Related Subjects

58 GEOSCIENCES
Madden-Julian oscillation
tropical convection
diabatic heating
model evaluation
hindcasts
diabatic moistening