Dynamics and Predictability of Large-Scale, High-Impact Weather and Climate Events
Special Publications of the International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics Series

Based largely on an International Commission on Dynamical Meteorology (ICDM) workshop, this timely volume, written by leading researchers in the field, covers a range of important research issues related to high-impact weather and extreme climate events. Dynamical linkages between these extremes and various atmospheric and ocean phenomena are examined, including Atlantic Multidecadal, North Atlantic, and Madden?Julian Oscillations; Annular Modes; tropical cyclones; and Asian monsoons. This book also examines the predictability of high-impact weather and extreme climate events on multiple time scales. Highlighting recent research and new advances in the field, this book enhances understanding of dynamical and physical processes associated with these events to help managers and policy makers make informed decisions to manage risk and prevent or mitigate disasters. It also provides guidance on future research directions in atmospheric science, meteorology, climate science, and weather forecasting, for experts and young scientists.

Preface; Acknowledgements; List of contributors; Part I. Diagnostics and Prediction of High-Impact Weather: 1. Global prediction of high-impact weather: diagnosis and performance Mark Rodwell and Alan Thorpe; 2. Severe weather diagnosis from the perspective of generalized slantwise vorticity development Guoxiong Wu, Yongjun Zheng and Yimin Liu; 3. Probabilistic extreme event attribution Pardeep Pall, Michael Wehner and Dáithí Stone; 4. Observed and projected changes in temperature and precipitation extremes Xuebin Zhang and Francis Zwiers; Part II. High-Impact Weather in Mid-Latitudes: 5. Rossby wave breaking: climatology, interaction with low-frequency climate variability, and links to extreme weather events Olivia Martius and Gwendal Rivière; 6. The influence of jet stream regime on extreme weather events Nili Harnik, Chaim Garfinkel and Orli Lachmy; 7. Forecasting high-impact weather using ensemble prediction systems Richard Swinbank, Petra Friederichs and Sabrina Wahl; 8. Storm tracks, blocking and climate change: a review Tim Woollings; 9. The North Atlantic and Arctic Oscillations: climate variability, extremes and stratosphere troposphere interaction Adam A. Scaife; Part III. Tropical Cyclones: 10. Opportunities and challenges in dynamical and predictability studies of tropical cyclone events Russell L. Elsberry and Hsiao-Chung Tsai; 11. Predictability of severe weather and tropical cyclones at the mesoscales Fuqing Zhang, Christopher Melhauser, Dandan Tao, Y. Qiang Sun, Erin B. Munsell, Yonghui Weng and Jason A. Sippel; 12. Dynamics, predictability, and high-impact weather associated with the extratropical transition of tropical cyclones Patrick Harr and Heather M. Archambault; 13. Secondary eyewall formation in tropical cyclones Chun-Chieh Wu, Yi-Hsuan Huang and Zhe-Min Tan; 14. Seasonal forecasting of floods and tropical cyclones Tom Beer and Oscar Alves; Part IV. Heat-Waves and Cold-Air Outbreaks: 15. European heat waves: the effect of soil moisture, vegetation and land use Fabio D'Andrea, Philippe Drobinski and Marc Stéfanon; 16. Western North American extreme heat, associated large scale synoptic-dynamics, and performance by a climate model Richard Grotjahn; 17. Decadel to interdecadel variations of Northern China heatwave frequency: impact of the Tibetan Plateau snow cover Zhiwei Wu and Jianping Li; 18. Global warming targets and heatwave risk Robin Clark; 19. Cold-air outbreaks over East Asia associated with blocking highs: mechanisms and their interaction with the polar stratosphere Hisashi Nakamura, Kazuaki Nishii, Lin Wang, Yvan J. Orsolini and Koutarou Takaya; Part V. Ocean Connections: 20. Response of the Atlantic Ocean circulation to North Atlantic freshwater perturbations Henk A. Dijkstra; 21. Key role of Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation in twentieth-century drought and wet periods over the US Great Plains and the Sahel Sumant Nigam and Alfredo Ruiz-Barradas; 22. Floods and droughts along the Guinea Coast in connection with the South Atlantic Dipole Hyacinth C. Nnamchi and Jianping Li; 23. The effect of global dynamical factors on the interannual variability of land-based rainfall Peter G. Baines and Benjamin J. Henley; 24. MJO and extreme weather and climate events Chidong Zhang; Part VI. Asian Monsoons: 25. Extreme weather and seasonal events during the Indian summer monsoon and prospects of improvement in their prediction skill under India's monsoon mission D. R. Sikka; 26. Interannual variability and predictability of summer climate over the Northwest Pacific and East Asia Shang-Ping Xie and Yu Kosaka; 27. Impacts of Annular Modes on extreme climate events over the East Asian monsoon region Jianping Li; Index.

Jianping Li is Dean and Professor at the College of Global Change and Earth System Sciences (GCESS), Beijing Normal University. He is also an affiliated faculty member of the University of Hawaii, a Fellow of International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics (IUGG) and a Fellow of the Royal Meteorological Society. His major research interests include climate dynamics and climate change, predictability, monsoons, and annular modes. He is Vice-Chair of the IUGG Commission on Climatic and Environmental Change (CCEC), and Executive Secretary of the International Commission of Climate (ICCL) within IAMAS (International Association of Meteorology and Atmospheric Sciences).
Richard Swinbank is a Scientific Manager in Weather Science at the Met Office in the UK and a Fellow of the Royal Meteorological Society. He is currently President of the IAMAS International Commission on Dynamical Meteorology (ICDM) and Co-Chair of the World Weather Research Programme (WWRP) working group on Predictability, Dynamics and Ensemble Forecasting (PDEF). His research interests include ensemble forecasting, data assimilation, atmospheric dynamics and predictability of high-impact weather.
Richard Grotjahn is Professor of Climate Dynamics at the University of California, Davis. He is currently Secretary of the ICDM commission of IAMAS, and is Co-Chair of the US CLIVAR working group on Large Scale Circulation Patterns Associated with Extremes. His research interests include extreme weather, climate model assessment, and large scale atmospheric synoptic-dynamics.
Hans Volkert is Senior Scientist at the Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt (DLR), Institut für Physik der Atmosphäre (IPA), Germany, and currently serves as the Secretary-General of IAMAS. He was appointed by the Council of the IUGG in 2011 as one of the Union's three liaison officers to the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), with a focus on atmospheric issues. His main research interests are in mesoscale meteorology,