[A-CG33] Extratropical oceans and atmosphere

[ACG33-16] Climatic Hotspot2 project in Japan: results for the first three years

*Masami Nonaka¹ (1.Application Laboratory, Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology)

Keywords:air-sea interaction, midlatitude, climatic hotspot, extreme events, observations, prediction

Frequency of extreme rainfalls and snowfalls has been increasing these years, and those events severely affect human lives and properties. It has been considered that tropical ocean and atmosphere variability as well as the warming climate, remotely influences mid-latitude extreme weather/climate, while the mid-latitude ocean is passive to atmospheric variability. Recent high-resolution ocean/atmospheric data analyses, however, have revealed that mid-latitude ocean also influences atmospheric circulations and their variability. Rediscovering strong warm current and associated strong ocean frontal zones as “climate hotspot”, we have elucidated mechanisms of ocean-atmosphere interactions. The research progress has prompted a new crucial task: application of such new knowledge to predictions of extreme rainfalls/snowfalls and climate variability. For the new task, in the five-year research project called “Climatic Hotspot2”, we have conducted studies to further our understandings of mid-latitude ocean-atmosphere interaction processes. In the project, several observation campaigns and also oceanic and atmospheric high-resolution numerical modeling studies have been/will be conducted. Those studies have revealed crucial influences of ocean currents and oceanic structures on climate extreme events. In this presentation, we introduce results of the projects, and also plans of observation campaigns.