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Strengthened linkage between midlatitudes and Arctic in boreal winter

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Abstract

Early studies have suggested a linkage between the surface warming over the Barents-Kara Seas and the strength of the Siberian high in boreal winter. Here, we show that the linkage is not stable, and with an apparent interdecadal change in the late-1990s. Coinciding with Arctic surface warm anomalies in recent decades (1997–2017), the Siberian high has been significantly intensified, the East Asian jet stream has expanded westward, and an apparent Rossby wave has propagated from the Arctic to East Asia, suggesting an atmospheric teleconnection between midlatitudes and Arctic. In contrast, midlatitude atmospheric circulation anomalies coinciding with Arctic surface warm anomalies were barely statistically significant during 1979–1996. The associated strong anomalous ascending/descending motions and divergent/convergent upper troposphere air masses over the Arctic-Eurasian sector seem to have favored the midlatitude-Arctic linkage during 1997–2017. We further hypothesize that Arctic mid-tropospheric warming plays a crucial role for the linkage between midlatitudes and Arctic in boreal winter. Multi-model simulations support this, and also point to internal atmospheric variability as the cause for the interdecadal shift in the strength of the midlatitude-Arctic linkage.

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Acknowledgements

This research was supported by the National Key R&D Program of China (2016YFA0600703), the CONNECTED supported by UTFORSK Partnership Program (UTF-2016-long-term/10030), the Research Council of Norway supported project SNOWGLACE (244166/E10) and InterDec (260393), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grants 41875118, 41505073, 41605059, 41421004, and 41790472), the Young Talent Support Program by China Association for Science and Technology (Grant 2016QNRC001), the Postgraduate Research & Practice Innovation Program of Jiangsu Province (KYCX18_0997), the funding of Jiangsu innovation and entrepreneurship team, and the Priority Academic Program Development (PAPD) of Jiangsu Higher Education Institutions.

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Xu, X., He, S., Gao, Y. et al. Strengthened linkage between midlatitudes and Arctic in boreal winter. Clim Dyn 53, 3971–3983 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00382-019-04764-7

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