Speaker Dr Rhys Parfitt
Associate Professor in Department of Earth, Ocean and Atmospheric Science at Florida State University
New perspectives on ocean-atmosphere interaction: moving forwards in time, not backwards
Outside of the tropics, much of the oceanic influence on the atmosphere is traditionally explained through time-mean mechanisms that assume the cancellation of shorter timescale noise (i.e., weather.
This talk argues that an alternative viewpoint is more appropriate: that the oceanic influence on the atmosphere should instead be considered as a direct accumulation of shorter timescale processes. For example, it is shown that ocean-weather interactions can explain 1) the increased rainfall found on average over warm ocean eddies, 2) the time-mean near-surface wind convergence anchored over strong sea-surface temperature fronts, and 3) the average structure of extra-tropically transitioned tropical cyclones in different ocean basins.
The key to this new paradigm is the atmospheric front, which serves as the junction between weather and climate.
The importance of atmospheric fronts is also underscored by new results suggesting a link between sub-monthly variability in the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation and variability in the North Atlantic Oscillation several months later.