Observational and model evidence for a prominent stratospheric influence on variability in tropospheric nitrous oxide

Nevison, Cynthia D.; Liang, Qing; Newman, Paul A.; Stephens, Britton B.; Dutton, Geoff; Lan, Xin; Commane, Roisin; Gonzalez, Yenny; Kort, Eric

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-24-10513-2024

Articles | Volume 24, issue 18

https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-24-10513-2024

© Author(s) 2024. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-24-10513-2024

© Author(s) 2024. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Articles | Volume 24, issue 18

Research article

|

20 Sep 2024

Research article |

| 20 Sep 2024

Observational and model evidence for a prominent stratospheric influence on variability in tropospheric nitrous oxide

Cynthia D. Nevison, Qing Liang, Paul A. Newman, Britton B. Stephens, Geoff Dutton, Xin Lan, Roisin Commane, Yenny Gonzalez, and Eric Kort

Supplement

https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-24-10513-2024-supplement

Data sets

ORCAS Merge Products, Version 1.0 B. Stephens https://doi.org/10.5065/D6SB445X

HIPPO Merged 10-Second Meteorology S. Wofsy et al. https://doi.org/10.3334/CDIAC/HIPPO_010

ATom: Merged Atmospheric Chemistry S. C. Wofsy et al. https://doi.org/10.3334/ORNLDAAC/1925

Atmospheric Nitrous Oxide Dry Air Mole Fractions from the NOAA GML Carbon Cycle Cooperative Global Air Sampling Network X. Lan et al. https://doi.org/10.15138/53g1-x417

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Short summary

This study examines the drivers of interannual variability in tropospheric N₂O. New insights are obtained from aircraft data and a chemistry–climate model that explicitly simulates stratospheric N₂O. The stratosphere is found to be the dominant driver of N₂O variability in the Northern Hemisphere, while both the stratosphere and El Niño cycles are important in the Southern Hemisphere. These results are consistent with known atmospheric dynamics and differences between the hemispheres.