J. David Neelin, Mojib Latif and Fei-Fei Jin
Ann. Rev. Fluid Mech., 1994.
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© Copyright 1994 by Annual Reviews Inc.
INTRODUCTION. Large-scale ocean-atmosphere interaction plays a crucial role in natural climate variability on a broad range of time scales and in anthropogenic climate change. The development of coupled ocean-atmosphere models is thus widely regarded as essential for the simulation, understanding and prediction of the global climate system. Although these efforts typically benefit from years of previous work with atmospheric and oceanic models, coupling the two components represents a major step because of the new interactions introduced into the system. These can produce new phenomena, not found in either medium alone, the mechanisms for which present exciting theoretical problems. The removal of artificial negative feedbacks produced by fixed boundary conditions in the uncoupled case also provides a stringent test of physical processes represented in both component models.
Pioneering work on coupling oceanic and atmospheric general circulation models (GCMs) began during the late 1960s and the 1970s (Manabe & Bryan 1969, Bryan et al 1975, Manabe et al 1975, Manabe et al 1979, Washington et al 1980). The difficulties encountered in obtaining accurate climate simulations with these models were sufficient that use of such coupled GCMs (CGCMs) did not gain momentum until the late 1980s and early 1990s. While the anthropogenic warming problem drove the development of global models (e.g., Gates et al 1985, Schlesinger et al 1985, Sperber et al 1987, Bryan et al 1988, Manabe & Stouffer 1988, Washington & Meehl 1989, Stouffer et al 1989, Manabe et al 1990, Cubasch et al 1992, Manabe et al 1992), evidence that ocean-atmosphere interaction is responsible for the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) phenomenon provided a driving force in the development of models aimed at the tropical regions, both CGCMs and less complex models.
In this article, we treat the dynamics of coupled models relating to internal variability of the climate system that arises through ocean-atmosphere interaction. The bulk is directed to the tropical problem because it has been more thoroughly studied than the extratropical problem, and the crucial role of coupling has been clearly demonstrated. The field has developed to a stage which can be well summarized, and where short-range climate prediction is becoming a reality. A briefer section provides an indication of developments for the problem of coupled extratropical variability, which is in its infancy.
Despite the importance of coupled models to the study of anthropogenic global warming, we do not address this question beyond providing an indication of some of the difficulties these models face. It is the subject of many articles (e.g., Mitchell 1989, Houghton et al 1990, Gates et al 1992 and references therein) and merits a separate review. For other general references on coupled models, we note a review of global CGCMs (Meehl 1990a), a textbook on the tropical problem (Philander 1990), edited volumes on climate modeling (Trenberth 1993, Schlesinger 1990) and selected conference proceedings (Nihoul 1985, 1990; Charnock & Philander 1989).
Citation. Neelin, J. D., M. Latif and F.-F. Jin, 1994: Dynamics of coupled ocean-atmosphere models: the tropical problem. Ann. Rev. Fluid Mech., 26, 617-659.
Acknowledgements. Support provided by National Science Foundation ATM-9215090, Presidential Young Investigator award ATM-9158294, National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration NA16RC0178/26GP00114-01, CEC Environmental Programme EV5V-CT-0121, the Max-Planck-Institut fuer Meteorologie and the Max-Planck Society.