The Evolution Characteristics of Daily-Scale Silk Road Pattern and Its Relationship with Summer Temperature in the Yangtze River Valley

Abstract

By employing multi-reanalysis daily datasets and station data, this study focuses on the evolution characteristics of the daily-scale Silk Road pattern (SRP) and its effect on summer temperatures in the Yangtze River Valley (YRV). The results manifest that the evolution characteristics of positive- and negative-phase SRP (referred to SRP+ and SRP−) exhibit marked distinctions. The anomaly centers of SRP+ over West Central Asia (WCA) and Mongolia emerge firstly, vanishing simultaneously one week after peak date; however, the Far East (FE) anomaly centers can persist for a longer period. The SRP− starts with the WCA and FE centers, with a rapid decline in the strength of the WCA center and preservation of other anomaly centers after its peak. In the vertical direction, daily-scale SRP mainly concentrates in the mid-to-upper troposphere. Baroclinicity accounts for its early development and barotropic instability process favors the maintenance. Moreover, the SRP+ (SRP−) is inextricably linked to heat wave (cool summer) processes in the YRV. Concretely, before the onset of SRP+ events, an anomalous anticyclone and significant negative vorticities over East Asia related to SRP+ favor the zonal advance between the South Asia high (SAH) and western Pacific subtropical high (WPSH), inducing local descents over YRV area. The sinking adiabatic warming and clear-sky radiation warming can be considered as the possible causes for the YRV heat waves. The adiabatic cooling with the local ascents leads to more total cloud cover (positive precipitation anomalies) and less solar radiation incident to surface of the YRV, inducing the cool summer process during SRP−.

Keywords

• Silk Road pattern
• evolution characteristics
• summer temperature
• Yangtze River Valley