Dynamic Arctic weather variability and connectivity

TL;DR

This paper introduces a complexity-based framework to analyze Arctic weather variability and its planetary impacts, revealing increased variability, teleconnections, and feedback loops driven by Arctic amplification under climate change.

Contribution

It develops a novel complexity science approach to quantify and understand Arctic weather variability and its influence on global weather patterns and extreme events.

Findings

Arctic weather variability correlates with Arctic Oscillation at intraseasonal scales.

Daily Arctic sea ice variability is increasing due to climate warming.

Teleconnections create feedback loops between Arctic and global weather patterns.

Abstract

The rapidly shrinking Arctic sea ice is changing weather patterns and disrupting the balance of nature. Dynamics of Arctic weather variability (WV) plays a crucial role in weather forecasting and is closely related to extreme weather events. Yet, assessing and quantifying the WV for both local Arctic regions and its planetary impacts under anthropogenic climate change is still unknown. Here, we develop a complexity-based approach to systematically evaluate and analyze the dynamic behaviour of WV. We reveal that the WV within and around the Arctic is statistically correlated to the Arctic Oscillation at the intraseasonal time scale. We further find that the variability of the daily Arctic sea ice is increasing due to its dramatic decline under a warming climate. Unstable Arctic weather conditions can disturb regional weather patterns through atmospheric teleconnection pathways, resulting in higher risk to human activities and greater weather forecast uncertainty. A multivariate climate network analysis reveals the existence of such teleconnections and implies a positive feedback loop between the Arctic and global weather instabilities. This enhances the mechanistic understanding of the influence of Arctic amplification on mid-latitude severe weather. Our framework provides a fresh perspective on the linkage of complexity science, WV and the Arctic.