Organization of storm tracks in zonally varying flows

Abstract

A simple two-layer quasigeostrophic model is employed to investigate the sensitivity of storm tracks to changes in an externally imposed, zonally varying large-scale flow. Zonally asymmetric temperature and horizontal deformation fields are varied systematically in order to compare the effects of baroclinicity and horizontal deformation on storm track dynamics. The sensitivity of the storm tracks to uniform barotropic zonal flows is also examined. Sensitivities of the location of the storm tracks to changes in large-scale flow parameters are well captured by linear calculations, although sensitivities of the strength of the storm tracks are not. -from Authors