Identification

Title

QBO modulation of traveling planetary waves during northern winter

Abstract

This study analyzes geopotential height data from the ERA-40 and ERA-Interim reanalyses for the period of 1958-2009 to provide some new insights on the stratospheric Quasi-Biennial Oscillation (QBO) modulation of traveling planetary waves during Northern Hemisphere (NH) winter. In the stratosphere, the zonal wave number 1-3 waves with periods of 22.5-30 days and 45-60 days are found to be significantly stronger at midlatitudes when the QBO at 50 hPa is in its westerly phase than when it is in its easterly phase. The modulation is stronger for eastward propagating and standing waves and weaker for westward propagating waves. A QBO modulation of 11-13 day planetary waves is also found but the effect is dominated by post-satellite data. In the troposphere, significant QBO modulation is only detected in westward propagating waves at zonal wave number 2 with periods of 22.5-30 days in early winter (Oct-Dec). Consistent results in the stratosphere are obtained using the temperature data from SABER/TIMED. The SABER data also show that the QBO effect on the eastward propagating 23-day waves extends into the mesosphere (∼70 km) for wave number 1 and only up to the stratopause (∼45 km) for wave numbers 2 and 3. We suggest that the 22.5-30 day planetary waves are secondary waves generated by a nonlinear coupling between zonal-mean intraseasonal oscillations (ISO) and the well-known 16-day planetary waves. The QBO modulation of those planetary waves is due to a QBO-ISO interaction. Further studies are needed to prove this hypothesis.

Resource type

document

Resource locator

Unique resource identifier

code

http://n2t.net/ark:/85065/d7r78fwf

codeSpace

Dataset language

eng

Spatial reference system

code identifying the spatial reference system

Classification of spatial data and services

Topic category

geoscientificInformation

Keywords

Keyword set

keyword value

Text

originating controlled vocabulary

title

Resource Type

reference date

date type

publication

effective date

2016-01-01T00:00:00Z

Geographic location

West bounding longitude

East bounding longitude

North bounding latitude

South bounding latitude

Temporal reference

Temporal extent

Begin position

End position

Dataset reference date

date type

publication

effective date

2012-05-02T00:00:00Z

Frequency of update

Quality and validity

Lineage

Conformity

Data format

name of format

version of format

Constraints related to access and use

Constraint set

Use constraints

Limitations on public access

None

Responsible organisations

Responsible party

contact position

OpenSky Support

organisation name

UCAR/NCAR - Library

full postal address

PO Box 3000

Boulder

80307-3000

email address

opensky@ucar.edu

web address

http://opensky.ucar.edu/

name: homepage

responsible party role

pointOfContact

Metadata on metadata

Metadata point of contact