HR: 1340h
AN: A13B-0103    [Abstracts]
TI: Hemispheric-Scale Climate Response to Northern Eurasia Snow Anomalies
AU: * Gong, G
EM: gg2138@columbia.edu
AF: Columbia University Earth and Environmental Engineering, 500 West 120th Street MC 4711, New York, NY 10027 United States
AU: Entekhabi, D
EM: darae@mit.edu
AF: Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Ralph M. Parsons Lab Room 48-331, Cambridge, MA 02139 United States
AU: Cohen, J
EM: jcohen@aer.com
AF: Atmospheric and Environmental Research, Inc., 131 Hartwell Ave, Lexington, MA 02421 United States
AB: Seasonal snow cover represents one of the dominant land surface characteristics within Northern Eurasia. This large, contiguous region is essentially snow-free during the summer season, and completely snow-covered during the winter. However, the transition between these two states during the autumn and spring seasons is subject to considerable interannual variability. Our research over the past several years has demonstrated that anomalies in Northern Eurasia autumn snow conditions can influence winter climate throughout the entire Northern Hemisphere. Observational analyses have detected a significant statistical relationship between autumn snow anomalies and the winter Arctic Oscillation (AO) Index, the dominant mode of Northern Hemisphere climate variability. Numerical general circulation model experiments have attributed this large-scale climatic response explicitly to regional Northern Eurasia snow forcings, and identified physically-based mechanisms by which this teleconnection occurs. Additional model experiments have identified unique orographic features in Northern Eurasia which enable this relationship. Our research reveals new ways by which the surface energy budget and water cycle of Northern Eurasia interacts with and alters the Earth's atmosphere and climate. This work also suggests Northern Eurasia as a potentially important precursive region for seasonal climate prediction.
DE: 3322 Land/atmosphere interactions
DE: 1833 Hydroclimatology
DE: 1863 Snow and ice (1827)
DE: 1620 Climate dynamics (3309)
SC: Atmospheric Sciences [A]
MN: 2004 AGU Fall Meeting