Anthropogenic aerosol forcing of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation and the associated mechanisms in CMIP6 models

Hassan, Taufiq; Allen, Robert J.; Liu, Wei; Randles, Cynthia A.

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-5821-2021

Articles | Volume 21, issue 8

https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-5821-2021

© Author(s) 2021. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-5821-2021

© Author(s) 2021. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Articles | Volume 21, issue 8

Research article

|

19 Apr 2021

Research article |

| 19 Apr 2021

Anthropogenic aerosol forcing of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation and the associated mechanisms in CMIP6 models

Taufiq Hassan, Robert J. Allen, Wei Liu, and Cynthia A. Randles

Supplement

https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-5821-2021-supplement

Data sets

Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 6 ESGF (Earth System Grid Federation) - LLNL https://esgf-node.llnl.gov/search/cmip6/

acccmip6 T. Hassan https://github.com/TaufiqHassan/acccmip6

Modern-Era Retrospective analysis for Research and Applications, version2 National Aeronautics and Space Administration https://gmao.gsfc.nasa.gov/reanalysis/MERRA-2/

NCEP/NCAR Reanalysis National Center for Atmospheric Research https://psl.noaa.gov/data/gridded/data.ncep.reanalysis.html

ERA5 ECMWF https://www.ecmwf.int/en/forecasts/datasets/reanalysis-datasets/era5

GISS Surface Temperature Analysis NOAA-PSL https://psl.noaa.gov/data/gridded/data.gistemp.html

Jones (CRU) Air Temperature Anomalies Version 4: CRUTEM4 NOAA-PSL https://psl.noaa.gov/data/gridded/data.crutem4.html#detail

NOAA Global Surface Temperature (NOAAGlobalTemp) NOAA-PSL https://psl.noaa.gov/data/gridded/data.noaaglobaltemp.html

RAPID National Oceanography Centre https://rapid.ac.uk/rapidmoc/rapid_data/datadl.php

Global Ocean Heat and Salt Content NCEI-NOAA https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/access/global-ocean-heat-content/

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Short summary

State-of-the-art climate models yield robust, externally forced changes in the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation (AMOC), the bulk of which are due to anthropogenic aerosol perturbations to net surface shortwave radiation and sea surface temperature. AMOC-related feedbacks act to reinforce this aerosol-forced response, largely due to changes in sea surface salinity (and hence sea surface density), with temperature- and cloud-related feedbacks acting to mute the initial response.