El Niño and La Niña events modulate the Earth's climate in a profound way. Being able to predict these impacts is important, yet there are still unanswered questions about the dynamics of ENSO itself. For instance, like the weather, ENSO has a limit of predictability. However, we still don't fully understand what this limit is and what it is set by: the subsurface signal you see to the left is our best source of predictability for ENSO but atmospheric variability introduces a lot of uncertainty in ENSO forecasts. Which one, the ocean or atmosphere, wins? That's what we're trying to figure out... |
Exactly how ENSO will change in a future climate remains uncertain. Will El Niño strengthen? Will El Niño events occur more frequently? These changes will impact the intensity and frequency of ENSO impacts globally. Changes in the mean climate will also impact how intense impacts will be and where. We are running a suite of climate model simulations to gain a better understanding of how these possible changes will impact the predictability of seasonal and daily extreme temperature and precipitation. |
As the climate warms, the ocean absorbs most of the excess heat. The ocean circulation can then redistribute this heat throughout the global ocean. The upper ocean circulation is primarily driven by the surface winds, but surface winds are also changing as the climate warms. In this project, we are trying to better understand how externally forced (e.g., greenhouse gases, aerosols) changes in the wind driven ocean circulation impact the pace of global warming. |
The pattern of Atlantic multidecadal sea surface temperature variability, often referred to as the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO), is well known to modulate European climate and Atlantic Hurricane season activity. Yet, there is still a lack of understanding of the governing mechanisms of the AMO and to what extent dynamics and processes in the ocean matter for the AMO. We're building a complex model hierarchy to improve our process-based understanding of the AMO. |