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This study investigates the influence of southeast tropical Indian Ocean (SETIO) sea surface temperature (SST) warming on Indo-Pacific climate during the decaying phase of the 2015/16 El Niño by using observations and model experiments. The results show that the SETIO SST warming in spring 2016 enhanced local convection and forced a “C-shape” wind anomaly pattern in the lower troposphere. The “C-shape” wind anomaly pattern over the eastern tropical Indian Ocean consists of anomalous westerly flow south of the equator and anomalous easterly flow north of the equator. The anomalous easterly flow then extended eastward into the western North Pacific (WNP) and facilitates the development or the maintenance of an anomalous anticyclone over the South China Sea (SCS). Correspondingly, the eastern part of the Bay of Bengal, the SCS and the WNP suffered less rainfall. Such precipitation features and the associated “C-shape” wind anomaly pattern shifted northward about five latitudes in summer 2016. Additionally, the SETIO warming can induce local meridional circulation anomalies, which directly affect Indo-Pacific climate. Numerical model experiments further confirm that the SETIO SST warming plays an important role in modulating Indo-Pacific climate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on the 10 years sea surface salinity (SSS) data from Argo, we identified a salinity dipole mode in the tropical Indian Ocean, termed S-IOD: a pattern of interannual SSS variability with anomalously low-salinity in the central equatorial and high-salinity in the southeastern tropical Indian Ocean. The S-IOD matures in November-December, lagging the Indian Ocean dipole (IOD) mode derived from sea surface temperature (SST) by 2 months. For the period of observations, the S-IOD persists longer than the IOD, until the following September-October. Oscillations of the two S-IOD poles are governed by different processes. Ocean advection associated with equatorial current variability dominates the SSS anomalies of the northern pole, while surface freshwater flux variability plays a key role in the SSS anomalies of the southern pole, where anomalous precipitation is sustained by preformed sea surface temperature anomalies. The S-IOD concurs with the strong IOD, reflecting an ocean-atmosphere coupling through the SST-precipitation-SSS feedback. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study re-explores the roles of tropical SST anomalies in modulating the anomalous cyclone over the Indo-western Pacific during strong La Niña decaying years via a series of numerical experiments. The results suggest that central to eastern equatorial Pacific cooling, western north Pacific (WNP) warming, and Indian Ocean cooling all contribute to the Indo-western Pacific cyclonic wind anomalies. The WNP SST anomalies play a role via a Rossby wave-type response. As the positive SST anomalies in the WNP decay, the local forcing effect decays as well. The Indian Ocean remote forcing seems to play an important role during boreal summer via cold Kelvin wave induced cyclonic shear and boundary layer convergence. During strong La Niña decaying years, the negative SST anomalies in the equatorial central to eastern Pacific can maintain and persist into summer. Such cooling could induce anomalous Walker circulation with ascending branch over the Maritime Continent to Philippines and descending branch over central to eastern Pacific, which links the WNP climate to the equatorial central and eastern Pacific SST anomalies. The convective heating over the WNP induced remotely by central to eastern Pacific cooling in turn forces atmospheric Rossby wave to its west, which may amplify the anomalous cyclone over the Indo-western Pacific. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The performance of 21 Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 5 (CMIP5) models in the simulation of the Indian Ocean Dipole (IOD) mode is evaluated. Compared to CMIP3, CMIP5 models exhibit a similar spread in IOD intensity. A detailed diagnosis was carried out to understand whether CMIP5 models have shown improvement in their representation of the important dynamical and thermodynamical feedbacks in the tropical Indian Ocean. These include the Bjerknes dynamic air-sea feedback, which includes the equatorial zonal wind response to sea surface temperature (SST) anomaly, the thermocline response to equatorial zonal wind forcing, the ocean subsurface temperature response to the thermocline variations, and the thermodynamic air-sea coupling that includes the wind-evaporation-SST and cloud-radiation-SST feedback. Compared to CMIP3, the CMIP5 ensemble produces a more realistic positive wind-evaporation-SST feedback during the IOD developing phase, while the simulation of Bjerknes dynamic feedback is more unrealistic especially with regard to the wind response to SST forcing and the thermocline response to surface wind forcing. The overall CMIP5 performance in the IOD simulation does not show remarkable improvements compared to CMIP3. It is further noted that the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and IOD amplitudes are closely related, if a model generates a strong ENSO, it is likely that this model also simulates a strong IOD. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]