Impacts of the long-term atmospheric trend on the seasonality of Antarctic sea ice.

The sea ice cover has experienced substantial changes in Antarctica in the past decades, yet its responses to the long-term trend of the local atmosphere are still not clear. With the aid of an Antarctic coupled sea ice-ocean-ice shelf model, the sea ice seasonality in response to the long-term trend of the local atmospheric forcing has been quantified based on a sea ice budget analysis. Significantly spatial variabilities have been found in the Antarctic sea ice in response to the long-term trend of the local atmospheric forcing. The sea ice area and volume decrease in the Weddell Sea and increase in the Ross Sea throughout the year. In the Amundsen-Bellingshausen Seas sector, the sea ice area decreases from December to June and increases from July to November, while the sea ice volume decreases throughout the year. In the Indian-Western Pacific Oceans sector, the sea ice area decreases from January to May and increases from June to December, while the sea ice volume increases throughout the year. The long-term trend of the local atmospheric forcing modulates the sea ice loss in the melting period mainly through modifying the ice-ocean heat flux over the ice base, while it governs the sea ice growth in the freezing period by the combined effects of the ice-ocean heat flux and the atmosphere-ocean heat flux. Although the trend of the surface wind can also lead to distinct variations by the local sea ice convergence/divergence, the integrated contributions over the basin scale are relatively small. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]