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Decadal modulation of the ENSO–East Asian winter monsoon relationship by the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation

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Abstract

This work investigates the decadal modulation of the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO)–East Asian winter monsoon (EAWM) relationship by the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO). A stable ENSO–EAWM relationship is found during the positive AMO phase but not during the negative phase. While the impact of El Niño events on the EAWM does not depend on the AMO phase, a different picture is observed for La Niña events. The La Niña boreal winter season coincides with a strengthened EAWM during a positive AMO phase and a weakened EAWM during a negative AMO phase. We suggest that the AMO’s modulating effect mainly comprises two pathways that influence ENSO’s impact on the EAWM. On one hand, when La Niña coincides with a positive AMO, the warm SST anomalies over the western North Pacific (WNP) are amplified both in intensity and spatial extent, which favors strengthened WNP cyclonic anomalies and an enhanced EAWM. During La Niña with a negative AMO, only very weak SST anomalies occur over the WNP with reduced WNP cyclonic anomalies that are confined to the tropics, thus having little effect on the EAWM. On the other hand, an eastward-propagating Rossby wavetrain across the mid-high latitudes of Eurasia during a warm AMO phase strengthens the Siberian high and thus leads to a strengthened EAWM, while during a cold AMO phase the Siberian high is weakened, leading to a reduced EAWM. In contrast, El Niño and its associated atmospheric responses are relatively strong and stable, independent of the AMO phase. These results carry important implications to the seasonal-to-interannual predictability associated with ENSO.

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Acknowledgements

This work is supported by the Special Fund for Public Welfare Industry (Meteorology) (GYHY201506013, GYHY201406022), and Qinglan Project and the Six Talent Peaks Project of Jiangsu Province.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. CIC-FEMD/ILCEC, Key Laboratory of Meteorological Disaster of Ministry of Education (KLME), College of Atmospheric Sciences, Nanjing University of Information Science and Technology, Nanjing, 210044, China

    Xin Geng, Wenjun Zhang, Peng Liu & Guirong Tan

  2. Department of Atmospheric Sciences, School of Ocean and Earth Science and Technology, University of Hawai’i at Mānoa, Honolulu, HI, 96822, USA

    Malte F. Stuecker & Fei-Fei Jin

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  1. Xin Geng
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  2. Wenjun Zhang
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  3. Malte F. Stuecker
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  4. Peng Liu
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  5. Fei-Fei Jin
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  6. Guirong Tan
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Correspondence to Wenjun Zhang.

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Geng, X., Zhang, W., Stuecker, M.F. et al. Decadal modulation of the ENSO–East Asian winter monsoon relationship by the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation. Clim Dyn 49, 2531–2544 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00382-016-3465-0

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