Articles | Volume 25, issue 7
https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-3873-2025
© Author(s) 2025. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-3873-2025
© Author(s) 2025. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
Research article
| 
03 Apr 2025
Research article |
| 03 Apr 2025
| 03 Apr 2025
Surface temperature dependence of stratospheric sulfate aerosol clear-sky forcing and feedback
Ravikiran Hegde
CORRESPONDING AUTHOR
Climate Physics Department, Max Planck Institute for Meteorology, Hamburg, Germany
School of Physics, Indian Institute of Science Education and Research Thiruvananthapuram, Thiruvananthapuram, India
Moritz Günther
Climate Physics Department, Max Planck Institute for Meteorology, Hamburg, Germany
Hauke Schmidt
CORRESPONDING AUTHOR
Climate Physics Department, Max Planck Institute for Meteorology, Hamburg, Germany
Clarissa Kroll
Climate Physics Department, Max Planck Institute for Meteorology, Hamburg, Germany
now at: Institute for Atmospheric and Climate Science, ETH Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland
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Hairu Ding, Bjorn Stevens, and Hauke Schmidt
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 25, 10511–10521, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-10511-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-10511-2025, 2025
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This study examines the physical link between subtropical highs and stratocumulus variability. Using reanalysis data, we test two proposed pathways – one at the surface and one in the free troposphere – but find that neither is a dominant mechanism for stratocumulus variability on seasonal and interannual timescales. These results challenge the assumed influence of subtropical highs on stratocumulus and highlight the need for further research into lower-tropospheric stability dynamics.
Wolfgang A. Müller, Stephan Lorenz, Trang V. Pham, Andrea Schneidereit, Renate Brokopf, Victor Brovkin, Nils Brüggemann, Fatemeh Chegini, Dietmar Dommenget, Kristina Fröhlich, Barbara Früh, Veronika Gayler, Helmuth Haak, Stefan Hagemann, Moritz Hanke, Tatiana Ilyina, Johann Jungclaus, Martin Köhler, Peter Korn, Luis Kornblüh, Clarissa Kroll, Julian Krüger, Karel Castro-Morales, Ulrike Niemeier, Holger Pohlmann, Iuliia Polkova, Roland Potthast, Thomas Riddick, Manuel Schlund, Tobias Stacke, Roland Wirth, Dakuan Yu, and Jochem Marotzke
EGUsphere, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2025-2473, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2025-2473, 2025
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ICON XPP is a newly developed Earth System model configuration based on the ICON modeling framework. It merges accomplishments from the recent operational numerical weather prediction model with well-established climate components for the ocean, land and ocean-biogeochemistry. ICON XPP reaches typical targets of a coupled climate simulation, and is able to run long integrations and large-ensemble experiments, making it suitable for climate predictions and projections, and for climate research.
Markus Kunze, Christoph Zülicke, Tarique A. Siddiqui, Claudia C. Stephan, Yosuke Yamazaki, Claudia Stolle, Sebastian Borchert, and Hauke Schmidt
Geosci. Model Dev., 18, 3359–3385, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-18-3359-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-18-3359-2025, 2025
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We present the Icosahedral Nonhydrostatic (ICON) general circulation model with an upper-atmospheric extension with the physics package for numerical weather prediction (UA-ICON(NWP)). We optimized the parameters for the gravity wave parameterizations and achieved realistic modeling of the thermal and dynamic states of the mesopause regions. UA-ICON(NWP) now shows a realistic frequency of major sudden stratospheric warmings and well-represented solar tides in temperature.
Abisha Mary Gnanaraj, Jiawei Bao, and Hauke Schmidt
Weather Clim. Dynam., 6, 489–503, https://doi.org/10.5194/wcd-6-489-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/wcd-6-489-2025, 2025
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We study how the Coriolis force caused by a planet's rotation affects its energy budget and habitability. Using an atmospheric general circulation model in a simplified water-covered planet setup, we analyse how rotation rates both slower and faster than Earth affect the amount of water vapour and clouds in the atmosphere. Our results suggest that rotation slower than Earth's makes the planet colder and drier, while faster rotation makes it warmer and moister, reducing its habitability.
Clarissa A. Kroll, Andrea Schneidereit, Robert C. J. Wills, Luis Kornblueh, and Ulrike Niemeier
EGUsphere, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2025-1212, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2025-1212, 2025
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The double Inter-Tropical Convergence Zone is a prominent precipitation bias in climate models. We demonstrate its persistence from a resolution of 160 km up to 5 km. Its root cause lies in biased moisture transport from the subtropics to the inner tropics reducing convection and weakening tropical circulation. Increasing the surface wind speed addresses the bias, but deteriorates the global circulation. This highlights the importance of resolution hierarchies and parametrization development.
Moritz Günther, Hauke Schmidt, Claudia Timmreck, and Matthew Toohey
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 24, 7203–7225, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-24-7203-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-24-7203-2024, 2024
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Stratospheric aerosol has been shown to cause pronounced cooling in the tropical Indian and western Pacific oceans. Using a climate model, we show that this arises from enhanced meridional energy export via the stratosphere. The aerosol causes stratospheric heating and thus an acceleration of the Brewer–Dobson circulation that accomplishes this transport. Our findings highlight the importance of circulation adjustments and surface perspectives on forcing for understanding temperature responses.
Hauke Schmidt, Sebastian Rast, Jiawei Bao, Amrit Cassim, Shih-Wei Fang, Diego Jimenez-de la Cuesta, Paul Keil, Lukas Kluft, Clarissa Kroll, Theresa Lang, Ulrike Niemeier, Andrea Schneidereit, Andrew I. L. Williams, and Bjorn Stevens
Geosci. Model Dev., 17, 1563–1584, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-17-1563-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-17-1563-2024, 2024
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A recent development in numerical simulations of the global atmosphere is the increase in horizontal resolution to grid spacings of a few kilometers. However, the vertical grid spacing of these models has not been reduced at the same rate as the horizontal grid spacing. Here, we assess the effects of much finer vertical grid spacings, in particular the impacts on cloud quantities and the atmospheric energy balance.
Sandra Wallis, Hauke Schmidt, and Christian von Savigny
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 23, 7001–7014, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-23-7001-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-23-7001-2023, 2023
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Strong volcanic eruptions are able to alter the temperature and the circulation of the middle atmosphere. This study simulates the atmospheric response to an idealized strong tropical eruption and focuses on the impact on the mesosphere. The simulations show a warming of the polar summer mesopause in the first November after the eruption. Our study indicates that this is mainly due to dynamical coupling in the summer hemisphere with a potential contribution from interhemispheric coupling.
Cathy Hohenegger, Peter Korn, Leonidas Linardakis, René Redler, Reiner Schnur, Panagiotis Adamidis, Jiawei Bao, Swantje Bastin, Milad Behravesh, Martin Bergemann, Joachim Biercamp, Hendryk Bockelmann, Renate Brokopf, Nils Brüggemann, Lucas Casaroli, Fatemeh Chegini, George Datseris, Monika Esch, Geet George, Marco Giorgetta, Oliver Gutjahr, Helmuth Haak, Moritz Hanke, Tatiana Ilyina, Thomas Jahns, Johann Jungclaus, Marcel Kern, Daniel Klocke, Lukas Kluft, Tobias Kölling, Luis Kornblueh, Sergey Kosukhin, Clarissa Kroll, Junhong Lee, Thorsten Mauritsen, Carolin Mehlmann, Theresa Mieslinger, Ann Kristin Naumann, Laura Paccini, Angel Peinado, Divya Sri Praturi, Dian Putrasahan, Sebastian Rast, Thomas Riddick, Niklas Roeber, Hauke Schmidt, Uwe Schulzweida, Florian Schütte, Hans Segura, Radomyra Shevchenko, Vikram Singh, Mia Specht, Claudia Christine Stephan, Jin-Song von Storch, Raphaela Vogel, Christian Wengel, Marius Winkler, Florian Ziemen, Jochem Marotzke, and Bjorn Stevens
Geosci. Model Dev., 16, 779–811, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-16-779-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-16-779-2023, 2023
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Models of the Earth system used to understand climate and predict its change typically employ a grid spacing of about 100 km. Yet, many atmospheric and oceanic processes occur on much smaller scales. In this study, we present a new model configuration designed for the simulation of the components of the Earth system and their interactions at kilometer and smaller scales, allowing an explicit representation of the main drivers of the flow of energy and matter by solving the underlying equations.
Shih-Wei Fang, Claudia Timmreck, Johann Jungclaus, Kirstin Krüger, and Hauke Schmidt
Earth Syst. Dynam., 13, 1535–1555, https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-13-1535-2022, https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-13-1535-2022, 2022
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The early 19th century was the coldest period over the past 500 years, when strong tropical volcanic events and a solar minimum coincided. This study quantifies potential surface cooling from the solar and volcanic forcing in the early 19th century with large ensemble simulations, and identifies the regions that their impacts cannot be simply additive. The cooling perspective of Arctic amplification exists in both solar and post-volcano period with the albedo feedback as the main contribution.
Mohammad M. Khabbazan, Marius Stankoweit, Elnaz Roshan, Hauke Schmidt, and Hermann Held
Earth Syst. Dynam., 12, 1529–1542, https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-12-1529-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-12-1529-2021, 2021
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We ask for an optimal amount of solar radiation management (SRM) in conjunction with mitigation if global warming is limited to 2 °C and regional precipitation anomalies are confined to an amount ethically compatible with the 2 °C target. Then, compared to a scenario without regional targets, most of the SRM usage is eliminated from the portfolio even if transgressing regional targets are tolerated in terms of 1/10 of the standard deviation of natural variability.
Gunter Stober, Ales Kuchar, Dimitry Pokhotelov, Huixin Liu, Han-Li Liu, Hauke Schmidt, Christoph Jacobi, Kathrin Baumgarten, Peter Brown, Diego Janches, Damian Murphy, Alexander Kozlovsky, Mark Lester, Evgenia Belova, Johan Kero, and Nicholas Mitchell
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 21, 13855–13902, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-13855-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-13855-2021, 2021
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Little is known about the climate change of wind systems in the mesosphere and lower thermosphere at the edge of space at altitudes from 70–110 km. Meteor radars represent a well-accepted remote sensing technique to measure winds at these altitudes. Here we present a state-of-the-art climatological interhemispheric comparison using continuous and long-lasting observations from worldwide distributed meteor radars from the Arctic to the Antarctic and sophisticated general circulation models.
Clarissa Alicia Kroll, Sally Dacie, Alon Azoulay, Hauke Schmidt, and Claudia Timmreck
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 21, 6565–6591, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-6565-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-6565-2021, 2021
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Volcanic forcing is counteracted by stratospheric water vapor (SWV) entering the stratosphere as a consequence of aerosol-induced cold-point warming. We find that depending on the emission strength, aerosol profile height and season of the eruption, up to 4 % of the tropical aerosol forcing can be counterbalanced. A power function relationship between cold-point warming/SWV forcing and AOD in the yearly average is found, allowing us to estimate the SWV forcing for comparable eruptions.
Cathy W. Y. Li, Guy P. Brasseur, Hauke Schmidt, and Juan Pedro Mellado
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 21, 483–503, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-483-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-483-2021, 2021
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Intense and localised emissions of pollutants are common in urban environments, in which turbulence cannot mix these segregated pollutants efficiently in the atmosphere. Despite their relatively high resolution, regional models cannot resolve such segregation and assume instantaneous mixing of these pollutants in their model grids, which potentially induces significant error in the subsequent chemical calculation, based on our calculation with a model that explicitly resolves turbulent motions.
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Short summary
Using a one-dimensional radiative–convective equilibrium model, we show that in clear-sky conditions, stratospheric sulfate aerosol forcing weakens with increasing surface temperature while CO2 forcing varies much less. This effect arises as sulfate aerosol, unlike CO2, absorbs mainly at wavelengths where the atmosphere is optically thin. It thereby masks the surface emission, which increases with warming. The spectral masking also results in weaker radiative feedback when aerosol is present.
Using a one-dimensional radiative–convective equilibrium model, we show that in clear-sky...
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