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Interannual modulation of subtropical Atlantic boreal summer dust variability by ENSO

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Abstract

Dust variability in the climate system has been studied for several decades, yet there remains an incomplete understanding of the dynamical mechanisms controlling interannual and decadal variations in dust transport. The sparseness of multi-year observational datasets has limited our understanding of the relationship between climate variations and atmospheric dust. We use available in situ and satellite observations of dust and a century-length fully coupled Community Earth System Model (CESM) simulation to show that the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) exerts a control on North African dust transport during boreal summer. In CESM, this relationship is stronger over the dusty tropical North Atlantic than near Barbados, one of the few sites having a multi-decadal observed record. During strong La Niña summers in CESM, a statistically significant increase in lower tropospheric easterly wind is associated with an increase in North African dust transport over the Atlantic. Barbados dust and Pacific SST variability are only weakly correlated in both observations and CESM, suggesting that other processes are controlling the cross-basin variability of dust. We also use our CESM simulation to show that the relationship between downstream North African dust transport and ENSO fluctuates on multidecadal timescales and is associated with a phase shift in the North Atlantic Oscillation. Our findings indicate that existing observations of dust over the tropical North Atlantic are not extensive enough to completely describe the variability of dust and dust transport, and demonstrate the importance of global models to supplement and interpret observational records.

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Acknowledgments

This study forms a portion of the Ph.D. dissertation of M.J.D. Funding was provided by NSF (AGS-1048995), and by the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Science, Decadal and Regional Climate Prediction using Earth System Models (EaSM program). Battelle Memorial Institute operates the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory for the DOE under contract DE-AC06-76RLO 1830. We are grateful for the contribution made by Joseph M. Prospero (RSMAS, U. Miami), who provided us with the Barbados dust record. We also acknowledge Cynthia Twohy (NorthWest Research Associates and SIO) and Diego Melgar (UC-Berkeley) for improving the manuscript, and for assistance with the pseudo-principal component spectral analysis used in this study. Our CESM simulation can be accessed via an email inquiry (mdeflori@ucsd.edu).

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Correspondence to Michael J. DeFlorio.

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DeFlorio, M.J., Goodwin, I.D., Cayan, D.R. et al. Interannual modulation of subtropical Atlantic boreal summer dust variability by ENSO. Clim Dyn 46, 585–599 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00382-015-2600-7

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