Wen Zhou

Fudan University · Department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences

This study analyzes the response of East Asian surface air temperature (SAT) to the quasi-biennial oscillation (QBO) in boreal winter using the JRA-55 reanalysis dataset and the CAM6 model. East Asian SAT patterns in response to the boreal winter QBO vertical profile are derived from singular value decomposition (SVD) analysis. The leading mode of...

Tropical cyclone activity often leads to many adverse impacts and assessing their destructiveness is a crucial scientific concern. Here we investigated changes in the destructiveness of tropical cyclones worldwide using the power dissipation index and found that there is no clear trend in most basins, but a significant decrease in power dissipation...

The seasonal variation in wind resources has a great impact on wind energy generation, affecting the maintenance planning, operational strategies, and economic benefits of wind farms. Therefore, effective seasonal prediction of wind resources is crucial for the wind power industry. This study evaluates the seasonal prediction skill for global onsho...

Under global warming, understanding the long-term variation in different types of heatwaves is vital for China’s preparedness against escalating heat stress. This study investigates dry and wet heatwave shifts in eastern China over recent decades. Spatial trend analysis displays pronounced warming in inland midlatitudes and the Yangtze River Valley...

Wind resources play a pivotal role in building sustainable energy systems, crucial for mitigating and adapting to climate change. With the increasing frequency of extreme events under global warming, effective prediction of extreme wind resource potential can improve the safety of wind farms and other infrastructure, while optimizing resource alloc...

Arctic summer sea ice has shrunk considerably in recent decades. This study investigates springtime sea-ice surface melt onset in the Laptev Sea and East Siberian Sea, which are key seas along the Northeast Passage. Instead of region-mean melt onset, we define an index of melt advance, which is the areal percentage of a sea that has experienced sea...

This study reveals the remarkable interdecadal changes in the influence of boreal winter Arctic sea ice concentration (SIC) anomalies (ASICAs) in the Greenland–Barents Seas on the subsequent El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO) development. Winter ASICA is strongly associated with the subsequent winter ENSO before the late 1980s and after the late 2...

In July to August 2022, Pakistan suffered historic flooding while record-breaking heatwaves swept southern China, causing severe socioeconomic impacts. Similar extreme events have frequently coincided between two regions during the past 44 years, but the underlying mechanisms remain unclear. Using observations and a suite of model experiments, here...

Wave trains propagating across Eurasia at both high and low latitudes in winter are key to the climate variation over East Asia via modulating the cold surge and moisture supply, with different configurations inducing diverse impacts. In this study, the combined impacts of the Eurasian (EU) pattern and South Asian jet wave train (SAJW) at a 10–30-d...

China is significantly impacted by torrential rainfall induced by tropical cyclone (TC) activity particularly in South China (SC) and East China (EC). This study delineates the distinct TC activities associated with these regions over the western North Pacific (WNP). Our analysis reveals that in SC, positive TC rainfall is largely attributed to a s...

Two large ensemble simulations are adopted to investigate the relative contribution of external forcing and internal variability to Arctic sea ice variability on different timescales since 1960 by correcting the response error of models to external forcing using observational datasets. Our study suggests that previous approaches might overestimate...

This study investigates the activity of tropical cyclones (TCs) in the Bay of Bengal (BOB) from 1979 to 2018 to discover the mechanism affecting the contribution rate to the meridional moisture budget anomaly (MMBA) over the southern boundary of the Tibetan Plateau (SBTP). May and October–December are the bimodal phases of BOB TC frequency, which d...

This study investigates the interdecadal enhancement of the South China Sea–Western North Pacific monsoon trough (MT) and its relationship with tropical cyclone (TC) genesis in the mid-2000s. Analyses reveal pronounced intensification of the MT, increased synoptic-scale wave activity, and more TC genesis over the South China Sea –Philippine Sea aft...

Compound extreme events, encompassing drought, vegetation stress, wildfire severity, and heatwave intensity (CDVWHS), pose significant threats to societal, environmental, and health systems. Understanding the intricate relationships governing CDVWHS evolution and their interaction with climate teleconnections is crucial for effective climate adapta...

Plain Language Summary Under the influence of global warming, extreme events, especially floods and droughts, are becoming more frequent, severely limiting social and economic development and greatly affecting people's lives. Therefore, accurate global forecasts are crucial to help people adaptively respond as soon as possible. Currently, seasonal...

South China encountered an exceptionally heavy pre-summer rainy season in 2022 with the regional precipitation ranking first in the past 44 years. This study aims to analyze the multi-time scale variations of precipitation in this pre-summer rainy season to shed light on the complex dynamics influencing pre-summer precipitation over South China. Th...

Although the relationship between the environmental factors, such as weather conditions and air pollution, and COVID-19 case fatality rate (CFR) has been found, the impacts of these factors to which infected cases are exposed at different infectious stages (e.g., virus exposure time, incubation period, and at or after symptom onset) are still unkno...

East Asian floods and droughts in summer show a typical dipole pattern with a north-south oscillation centered near 30°N, called the southern drought–northern flood (SDNF) pattern, which has caused significant economic losses and casualties in the past three decades. However, effective explanations and predictions are still challenging, making suit...

This study explores the role of internal climate system forcing in the relationship between dust and tropical cyclones (TCs). Here internal climate system forcing includes the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO), Atlantic Meridional Mode (AMM), Sahel rainfall, North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO), and El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO). The dust‐T...

Global water scarcity threatens agriculture, food security, and human sustainability. Hence, understanding changes in terrestrial water storage (WS) is crucial. By utilizing climate models, reanalysis, and satellite data, we demonstrate the effectiveness of the multivariate bias correction technique in facilitating precise WS representation while e...

Arctic summer sea ice has shrunk considerably in recent decades. This study investigates sea-ice surface melt onset in springtime in the Laptev Sea and East Siberian Sea, which are key seas along the Northeast Passage. Melt Advance, which is defined as the areal percentage of a sea that has experienced sea-ice surface melting before the end of May,...

This work explores the modulation of the Pacific decadal oscillation (PDO) on the relationship between the occurrence position of rapid intensification (RI) events of tropical cyclones (TCs) over the western North Pacific (WNP) in boreal autumn and El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO). From the warm to cold phase of the PDO, the occurrence position...

The emergency of global‐scale hydroclimatic extremes (i.e., meteorological droughts, extreme precipitations, heat waves and cold surges) and associated compound events has recently drawn much attention. A global‐scale unified and comprehensive event set with accurate information on spatiotemporal evolutions is necessary for better mechanism underst...

This study examined the interaction between land use land cover (LULC) dynamics and thermal stress distribution using the universal thermal comfort index (UTCI) and different LULC classifications under two Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 6 (CMIP6) Shared Socioeconomic Pathways (i.e., SSP 370 and 585) climate and land use scenarios for t...

This study investigates the coupled variability of temperature and precipitation in eastern China during summer using empirical orthogonal function (EOF) analysis to better understand and mitigate simultaneous occurrences of extreme events, such as compound droughts and heat waves. Two dominant modes are identified: the first exhibits a strong warm...

Arctic summer sea ice has been declining in recent decades. In this study, we investigate the beginning of the Arctic melting season, i.e., sea ice melt onset (MO), in the Laptev Sea (LS) and East Siberian Sea (ESS) along the Northern Sea route. Three leading modes are identified by EOF decomposition, which we call the LE-mode, L-mode, and E-mode....

The multidecadal decrease of precipitation in North China since the 1960s has caused a significant impact on the ecological environment and social development. It has become a key concern for meteorologists and national decision-makers to understand what is driving this. To better understand the oceanic impact on the interdecadal variation of summe...

The statistical characteristics and mechanism of the South Atlantic Ocean Dipole (SAOD) from 1980 to 2021 are analysed using observational datasets. The spatial pattern of the sea surface temperature anomaly (SSTA) during SAOD is a dipole pattern oriented in the northeast‐southwest direction, and the intensity of the SSTA in the northeast pole (NEP...

The summer rainfall amount over East China is expected to increase along with a strengthening of the East Asian summer monsoon in a warmer climate. However, how the seasonality of precipitation will respond to global warming remains uncertain and is closely related to monsoon circulation. Here, we project future changes in multiple intra-seasonal r...

Although compound drought and heatwave extremes have recently drawn much attention, whether droughts are always concurrent with heatwaves remains unknown. Moreover, how temperature abnormalities evolve spatiotemporally during drought development and how their associated categories are distributed globally are not fully understood. In Part II, we in...

Knowledge of spatiotemporal characteristics and process evolutions is the fundamental basis of understanding drought mechanisms, especially from a global perspective. For a comprehensive investigation, we implemented event detection, type grouping, and spatiotemporal metrics from three-dimensional (3D, longitude-latitude-time) perspectives. The maj...

This paper analyzes the effect of the Australian High (AH) on the seasonal phase locking of Indian Ocean Dipole (IOD) events. The anomalous strong AH associated with the positive phase of the Antarctic Oscillation can cause significant easterly wind anomalies and northward cross‐equatorial flow over the western Maritime Continent (MC) by strengthen...

Although the trend of sea-ice extent under global warming has been studied extensively in recent years, most climate models have failed to capture the recent rapid change in the Arctic environment, which has brought into question the reliability of climate model projections of sea ice and suggested a potential shift in Arctic climate dynamics. Here...

In this study, observational and model datasets are used to analyze winter precipitation and its leading empirical orthogonal function (EOF1) mode over Southeast China. EOF1 displays a dominant monosign pattern during the last 60 years; however, its major impacting factors have a decadal transition near the mid-1990s. The first principal component...

Atmospheric blocking is a crucial driver of extreme weather events, but its climatological frequency is largely underestimated in state-of-the-art climate models, especially around the North Atlantic. While air-sea interaction along the North Atlantic oceanic frontal region is known to influence Atlantic blocking activity, remote effects from the P...

In this study, the relationship between AO and winter synoptic temperature variability (STV) over the Northern Hemisphere is examined in 34 CMIP5/CMIP6 model outputs. With significant model bias around the North Pacific and North Atlantic, most models fail to capture the correct AO–STV pattern in historical simulations compared to observations. To...

Understanding how droughts are characterized, propagated, and projected, particularly multivariate droughts, is necessary to explain the variability and changes in drought characteristics. This study aims to understand multimodel global drought monitoring, propagation, and projection by utilizing a multivariate standardized drought index (MSDI) dur...

This study presents a novel mechanism for the generation of extreme El Niño events by analyzing interactions between tropical cyclones (TCs) in the western North Pacific (WNP) in spring [March–May (MAM)] and summer [June–August (JJA)] and sea surface warming in the eastern tropical Pacific. It is suggested that anomalously strong TCs in the WNP in...

This study examined the interaction between land use and land cover (LULC) dynamics, trend and thermal stress distribution using the universal thermal comfort index (UTCI) and different LULC classifications under two Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 6 (CMIP6) Shared Socioeconomic Pathways (i.e., SSP 370 and 585) climate and land use scen...

Although the relationship between the environmental factors such as weather conditions and air pollution and COVID-19 case fatality rate (CFR) has been found, the impacts of these factors to which infected cases are exposed at different infectious stages (e.g., virus exposure time, incubation period, and at or after symptom onset) are still unknown...

Here, we analyze the characteristics and the formation mechanisms of low-level jets (LLJs) in the middle reaches of the Yangtze River during the 2010 mei-yu season using Wuhan station radiosonde data and the fifth generation of the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ERA5) reanalysis dataset. Our results show that the vertical struc...

Marine heatwaves (MHWs) are extreme climatic events that can have a significant impact on marine ecosystems and their services across the world. We examine the spatiotemporal variation of summer MHWs in the North Indian Ocean (NIO) and find that the whole NIO basin exhibits a pronounced spatial variability as well as a significant increasing trend...

During boreal winter, the invasion of cold air can lead to remarkable temperature drops in East Asia which can result in serious socioeconomic impacts. Here, we find that the intensity of strong synoptic cold days in the East China Sea and Indochina Peninsula are increasing. The enhanced synoptic cold days in these two regions are attributed to sur...

The El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO) plays a critical role in predicting the winter surface temperature over East Asia. Numerous studies have attempted to improve the seasonal forecasting skill in view of the combined effects of ENSO and oceanic–tropospheric factors. However, high uncertainty and notable challenges still exist in using the ENSO...

Climate change could exacerbate extreme climate events. This study investigated the global and continental representations of fourteen multisectoral climate indices during the historical (1979–2014), near future (2025–2060) and far future (2065–2100) periods under two emission scenarios, in eleven Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (CMIP) Genera...

The rainy season over southern China (SC) begins with the onset of the South China Sea monsoon around mid-May. We demonstrate here that the SC precipitation exhibits a notable drying (wetting) trend prior to (after) the monsoon onset, leading to a more abrupt thus amplified hydrological transition over SC in early summer. The contrasting precipitat...

This study investigates the variability of annual tropical cyclone (TC) frequency and intensity over six major ocean basins from 1980 to 2021. Statistical change-point and trend analyses were performed on the TC time series to detect significant decadal variation in TC activities. In the middle of the last decade of the 20th century, the frequency...

Spatially and temporally accurate event detection is a precondition for exploring the mechanisms of climate extremes. To achieve this, a classical unsupervised machine learning method, the DBSCAN (Density-Based Spatial Clustering of Applications with Noise) clustering algorithm, was employed in the present study. Furthermore, we developed a 3D (lon...

This study investigates the climatological spatial scales (CSSs) of meteorological droughts in China and the linkages to climate variability. The Global Precipitation Climatology Centre monthly gridded precipitation with a spatial resolution of 25 km × 25 km for 1961-2010 is used. The standardized precipitation index at different timescales (1-, 3-...

In general, tropical cyclone (TC) rainfall accumulation usually decreases with faster TC translation speed but increases with heavier rain rate. However, how the TC rain rate changes with translation speed is unclear. Here we show that, in all TC basins, the average TC rain rate significantly increases with translation speed. On average, the rain r...

Leading modes of interannual variability in upper-ocean salinity in the tropical Indian Ocean (TIO) and their connections were studied based on 17 years (2002–18) of oceanic historical and reanalysis data. Empirical orthogonal function (EOF) analysis depicted the dominant roles of the first two leading modes in salinity variability in the TIO over...

The relationship between North Atlantic tropical cyclone (TC) peak intensity and subsurface ocean temperature is investigated in this study using atmospheric and ocean reanalysis data. It is found that the peak intensity of basin-wide strong TCs (Categories 4 and 5) is positively correlated with subsurface ocean temperature in the extratropical Nor...

This study analyzes and discusses the characteristics of sea surface temperature (SST) in the Southern Indian Ocean, the changes in the location of the Indian Ocean Intertropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ), and their impact on precipitation in China from 1979 to 2021. Results show that the Southern Indian Ocean Dipole (SIOD), an SST southwest-northeas...

The impact of El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO) on the winter stratospheric polar vortex intensity (PVI) is re-examined, using JRA-55 datasets and the CESM2 model. Our results show that the negative correlation between ENSO and PVI has weakened in recent decades and is no longer statistically significant after the mid-1990s. This weakening ENSO–P...

Using reanalysis data and model simulations, this study reveals an increase in September landfalling North Atlantic tropical cyclones (TCs) during years that have a strengthened Saharan dust plume, and the related physical processes are investigated by analyzing the relationship of dust aerosol optical depth with TC track, intensity, and the relate...

Droughts and associated near-surface temperature anomalies can be attributed to amplified vertical subsidence and anomalous anticyclonic circulations from dynamic perspectives. However, two open and interesting issues remain unknown: 1) whether hydrometeorological situations under droughts can be reproduced directly utilizing variability of atmosph...

We investigate the uncertainty (i.e., inter-model spread) in future projections of the boreal winter climate, based on the forced response of ten models from the CMIP5 following the RCP8.5 scenario. The uncertainty in the forced response of sea level pressure (SLP) is large in the North Pacific, the North Atlantic, and the Arctic. A major part of t...

Previous studies have revealed that extratropical forcing can lead to changes in the intertropical convergence zone (ITCZ). Based on reanalysis data from 1979 to 2019, this paper discusses the influence of the South Pacific Ocean Dipole (SPOD, a dominant mode between the subtropics and extratropics in the South Pacific) and its coordination with EN...

Southern China has experienced a discernible early-spring drying trend in recent decades. This drying trend is a direct result of a severe deficiency of water vapor, which is induced by local descent anomalies and strong anomalous northerlies from the northwestern Pacific. The predominant anomalous northerlies are directly associated with two anoma...

Southeast Australia (SEA) experienced a wet February as well as an extremely wet March accompanied by devastating floods during 2021. Regional water vapor balance analysis at different levels indicates the leading role of water vapor inflow through zonal boundaries during February, and the dominant contribution of water vapor input through meridion...