HR: 08:15h
AN: PP21C-02    [Abstracts]
TI: Simulating the Atmospheric Climate of 3Ma
AU: * Barreiro, M
EM: barreiro@princeton.edu
AF: Princeton University, AOS Program, 205 Sayre Hall, Forrestal Campus, Princeton, NJ 08540
AU: Philander, G
EM: gphlder@princeton.edu
AF: Princeton University, AOS Program, 205 Sayre Hall, Forrestal Campus, Princeton, NJ 08540
AU: Pacanowski, R
EM: ron.pacanowski@noaa.gov
AF: Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory, Route 1, Forrestal Campus, Princeton, NJ 08540
AB: Recently, paleoclimate reconstruction have shown that permanent El Nino conditions prevailed in the tropical Pacific 3Ma. What was the role of the tropics at that time? Can the tropical conditions be at least partially reponsible for the warm climate during the early Pliocene? Here we present a first step toward addressing this issue in which atmospheric general circulation models are forced with different boundary conditions in the tropics to determine the response and their ability to reproduce key aspects of the atmospheric circulation 3Ma. We compare simulated surface temperature, hydrological cycle, wind stress and albedo, with those of today's climate, and look into the possibility that changes in surface atmospheric fluxes (of freshwater, heat and momentum) may in turn force the ocean generating a response that feeds back onto the atmosphere consistent with the boundary conditions, maintaining the climate.
DE: 3344 Paleoclimatology
DE: 3369 Thermospheric dynamics (0358)
DE: 4267 Paleoceanography
DE: 4522 El Ni¤o
SC: Paleoceanography and Paleoclimatology [PP]
MN: 2004 AGU Fall Meeting