Sharpness of the extratropical tropopause in baroclinic life cycle experiments

Abstract

The sharpness of the extratropical tropopause is investigated using baroclinic life cycle experiments. In these simulations, slow synoptic scale dynamics leads to a net tropopause sharpening. The mechanism involves vertical convergence of the ageostrophic wind. The results support earlier suggestions from idealized theoretical studies. Copyright 2007 by the American Geophysical Union.