The Surface Mass Balance in a Regional Climate Model of Antarctica

Understanding the Earth's climate system and
particularly climate variability presents one of the
most difficult and urgent challenges in science. The
Antarctic plays a crucial role in the global climate
system, since it is the principal region of radiative
energy deficit and atmospheric cooling. The
regional climate model HIRHAM has been used for
investigating the climate of Antarctica. In
comparison with the observations, the evaluation
shows that the simulations with the HIRHAM
model capture both the large and regional scale
circulation features with generally small bias in the
modeled variables. The decadal scale processes
were studied based on trend calculations. To better
understand the horizontal structure of mean sea level
pressure, temperature and net mass
balance trends the influence of the Antarctic
Oscillation (AAO) on the Antarctic climate was
investigated. For detailed investigation of global
teleconnection, two positive and one negative periods
of AAO phase were chosen. The differences in MSLP and
2m temperature between positive
and negative AAO years during the winter months
partly explain the surface cooling during the last
decades.

Autorentext

Dr. Ksenia Glushak was born in 1980 in Leningrad (USSR). She gota B.S. and M.S. degree in Meteorology from Russian StateHudrometeorological University,and Ph.D. from University Potsdam(Germany). Dr. Glushak has broad interests in climate studies.

Klappentext

Understanding the Earth's climate system andparticularly climate variability presents one of themost difficult and urgent challenges in science. TheAntarctic plays a crucial role in the global climatesystem, since it is the principal region of radiativeenergy deficit and atmospheric cooling. Theregional climate model HIRHAM has been used forinvestigating the climate of Antarctica. Incomparison with the observations, the evaluationshows that the simulations with the HIRHAMmodel capture both the large and regional scalecirculation features with generally small bias in themodeled variables. The decadal scale processeswere studied based on trend calculations. To betterunderstand the horizontal structure of mean sea levelpressure, temperature and net massbalance trends the influence of the Antarctic Oscillation (AAO) on the Antarctic climate was investigated. For detailed investigation of globalteleconnection, two positive and one negative periodsof AAO phase were chosen. The differences in MSLP and2m temperature between positiveand negative AAO years during the winter months partly explain the surface cooling during the lastdecades.