The Spring Persistent Rains (SPR) in the areas to the south of middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River or over southeastern China (SEC) is a unique synoptic and climatic phenomenon in East Asia. This study reveals a possible mechanism responsible for the climatic cause of SPR formation through climatic mean data analysis and sensitive numerical model experiments. SEC is located at the down-stream of the southwesterly velocity center (SWVC) which lies on the southeastern flank of the Tibetan Plateau (TP). As a result, there are strong southwesterly wind velocity convergence and moisture con-vergence over SEC. This is the immediate climatic cause of SPR formation. In spring, the seasonal evolution of the southwesterly velocity consists with the surface sensible heating over southeastern TP, indicating that the formation of SPR is related to not only the southwesterly wind of mechanical de-flected flow of TP, but also the southwesterly wind of thermal-forced cyclonic low circulation. Sensitive numerical experiments demonstrate that, without TP, both SWVC and the SPR rain belt will disappear. The southwesterly wind velocity increases almost linearly with the amount of the total diabatic heating with TP rising. Therefore, SWVC is the result of the mechanical forcing and thermal forcing of TP. All these strongly suggest that the presence of TP plays a primary role in the climatic formation of SPR.
WAN RiJin1,2,3 & WU GuoXiong1 1 State Key Laboratory of Numerical Modeling for Atmospheric Sciences and Geophysical Fluid Mechanicals (LASG), Institute of Atmospheric Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100029, China
Based on the traditional theory of wave mean flow interaction, an improved quasi-geostrophic Eliassen-Palm flux with diabatic heating included is deduced. It is shown that there exists an intrinsic relation between the atmospheric energy cycle derived by Lorenz and the wave energy transfer derived by Eliassen and Palm. From this relation it becomes clear that the energy propagation process of large-scale stationary wave is indeed a part of Lorenz energy cycle, and the energy transform from mean flow to wave equals the global mass integral of the divergence of local wave energy flux or the global integral of local wave energy. The diagnostic results by using NCEP/NCAR reanalysis data suggest that the classical adiabatic Eliassen-Palm flux relation can present only the wintertime wave energy transformation. For other seasons, however, the diabatic effect must be taken into account.
