Journal article
Sea surface warming patterns drive hydrological sensitivity uncertainties
- Abstract:
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The increase in global-mean precipitation with global-mean temperature (hydrological sensitivity; η) is constrained by the atmospheric energy budget, but its magnitude remains uncertain. Here we apply warming patch experiments to a climate model to demonstrate that the spatial pattern of sea surface warming can explain a wide range of η. Warming in tropical strongly ascending regions produces η values even larger than suggested by the Clausius–Clapeyron relationship (7% K−1), as the warming and moisture increases can propagate vertically and be transported globally through atmospheric dynamics. Differences in warming patterns are as important as different treatments of atmospheric physics in determining the spread of η in climate models. By accounting for the pattern effect, the global-mean precipitation over the past decades can be well reconstructed in terms of both magnitude and variability, indicating the vital role of the pattern effect in estimating future intensification of the hydrological cycle.
- Publication status:
- Published
- Peer review status:
- Peer reviewed
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- Files:
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(Preview, Version of record, pdf, 16.3MB, Terms of use)
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- Publisher copy:
- 10.1038/s41558-023-01678-5
Authors
- Publisher:
- Springer Nature
- Journal:
- Nature Climate Change More from this journal
- Issue:
- 13
- Pages:
- 545–553
- Publication date:
- 2023-05-25
- Acceptance date:
- 2023-04-20
- DOI:
- EISSN:
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1758-6798
- ISSN:
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1758-678X
- Language:
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English
- Keywords:
- Pubs id:
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1346936
- Local pid:
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pubs:1346936
- Deposit date:
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2023-05-29
Terms of use
- Copyright holder:
- Zhang et al.
- Copyright date:
- 2023
- Rights statement:
- © The Author(s) 2023. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons license and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder.
- Licence:
- CC Attribution (CC BY)
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