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Interdecadal variability of the early summer surface heat flux in the Kuroshio region and its impact on the Baiu frontal activity
Author(s) -
Tomita Tomohiko,
Sato Hiroyasu,
aka Masami,
Hara Masayuki
Publication year - 2007
Publication title -
geophysical research letters
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.007
H-Index - 273
eISSN - 1944-8007
pISSN - 0094-8276
DOI - 10.1029/2007gl029676
Subject(s) - climatology , sea surface temperature , zonal and meridional , flux (metallurgy) , environmental science , atmospheric circulation , geology , heat flux , atmospheric sciences , oceanography , heat transfer , materials science , physics , metallurgy , thermodynamics
In the Kuroshio region (KR), the early summer surface heat flux (SHF) exhibits a rapid increase around 1990 as a climate shift, which is rooted in the oceanic interdecadal variability in the North Pacific. The sea surface temperature (SST) in the KR, where SST is largely controlled by subsurface ocean circulations, is positively correlated with the local upward SHF. The positive SHF anomalies in the 1990s reinforced the Baiu frontal activity with an atmospheric large‐scale meridional dipole in the western North Pacific. As such, the oceanic interdecadal variability has an impact on the atmospheric circulation through coherent SST and SHF variations even in early summer in the KR.