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European climate variability is shaped by atmospheric dynamics over the North Atlantic and local processes. Better understanding their future seasonality is essential to anticipate changes in weather conditions for human and natural systems. We explore atmospheric seasonality over 1979–2017 and 1979–2100 with seasonal circulation regimes (SCRs), by clustering year‐round daily fields of Z500 from the ERA‐Interim reanalysis and 12 Coupled Model Intercomparison Project phase 5 (CMIP5) climate models (historical and RCP8.5 runs). The spatial and temporal variability of SCR structures and associated patterns of surface air temperature are investigated. Climate models have biases but reproduce structures and evolutions of SCRs similar to the reanalysis over 1979–2017: decreasing frequency of winter conditions (starting later and ending earlier in the year) and the opposite for summer conditions. These changes are stronger over 1979–2100 than over 1979–2017, associated with a large increase of North Atlantic seasonal mean Z500 and temperature. When using more SCRs (more freedom in definition of seasonality), the changes over 1979–2100 correspond to a long‐term swap between SCRs, resulting in similar structures (annual cycle and spatial patterns) relative to the evolution of seasonal mean Z500 and temperature. To understand whether the evolution of SCRs is linked to uniform warming, or to changes in circulation patterns, we remove the calendar trend in the Z500 regional average to define SCRs based on detrended data (d‐SCRs). The temporal properties of d‐SCRs appear almost constant whereas their spatial patterns change, indicating that the calendar Z500 regional trend drives the evolutions of SCRs, and that changing spatial patterns in d‐SCRs account for the heterogeneity of this trend. Our study suggests that historical winter conditions will continue to decrease in the future while historical summer conditions continue to increase. However, it also suggests that the spatial and temporal patterns of SCRs would remain similar, relatively to the year‐round Z500 increase. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drylands occupy about 41% of land surface and feed 38% of the world's population, where understanding drylands' water‐cycle is in urgent need. In this study, response of water‐cycle over the drylands to global warming from 1980 to 2015 and its mechanisms have been investigated in detail. The results show that, with the global surface air temperature (SAT) increasing at a rate of 0.03 K⋅year−1 over the drylands, an increased evaporation is found; however, the net water vapour transport over the global drylands appears an overall decreased rate of −0.24 mm⋅year−1. Due to global warming and atmospheric circulation anomalies, the evaporation increases by 1.1 mm⋅year−1, while the precipitation and runoff decrease by −2.32 and −0.8 mm⋅year−1, respectively. In addition, the precipitation conversion rate (PCR) tends to decrease during this period, while the precipitation recycling rate (PRR) shows slightly increasing trend, implying a more dependence of the precipitation on the local evaporation over the drylands. Overall, except the drylands of Africa, it indicates a weakened water‐cycle over the global drylands from 1980 to 2015. Though some findings have been revealed, there still remains some uncertainties due to the observation limitation on the water‐cycle components. Therefore, a comprehensive study including multi‐sourced data and model simulation is expected in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]