Aura OMI and MLS measurements are combined to produce daily maps of tropospheric ozone beginning October 2004. We show that El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) related inter-annual change in tropospheric ozone in the tropics is small in relation to combined intra-seasonal/Madden-Julian Oscillation (MJO) and shorter timescale variability by a factor of ∼ 3-10 (largest in the Atlantic). Outgoing longwave radiation (OLR), taken as a proxy for convection, suggests that convection is a dominant driver of large-scale variability of tropospheric ozone in the Pacific from inter-annual (e.g., ENSO) to weekly periods. We compare tropospheric ozone and OLR satellite observations with two simulations: (1) the Goddard Earth Observing System (GEOS) chemistry-climate model (CCM) that uses observed sea surface temperatures and is otherwise free-running, and (2) the NASA Global Modeling Initiative (GMI) chemical transport model (CTM) that is driven by Modern Era Retrospective-Analysis for Research and Applications (MERRA) analyses. It is shown that the CTM-simulated ozone accurately matches measurements for timescales from ENSO to intra-seasonal/MJO and even 1-2-week periods. The CCM simulation reproduces ENSO variability but not shorter timescales. These analyses suggest that a model used to delineate temporal and/or spatial properties of tropospheric ozone and convection in the tropics must reproduce both ENSO and non-ENSO variability.
CITATION STYLE
Ziemke, J. R., Douglass, A. R., Oman, L. D., Strahan, S. E., & Duncan, B. N. (2015). Tropospheric ozone variability in the tropics from ENSO to MJO and shorter timescales. Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics, 15(14), 8037–8049. https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-15-8037-2015
Mendeley helps you to discover research relevant for your work.