Christian L. E. Franzke, Susana Barbosa, Richard Blender, Hege-Beate Fredriksen, Thomas Laepple, Fabrice Lambert, Tine Nilsen, Kristoffer Rypdal, Martin Rypdal, Manuel G, Scotto, Stéphane Vannitsem, Nicholas W. Watkins, Lichao Yang, Naiming Yuan
{"title":"The Structure of Climate Variability Across Scales","authors":"Christian L. E. Franzke, Susana Barbosa, Richard Blender, Hege-Beate Fredriksen, Thomas Laepple, Fabrice Lambert, Tine Nilsen, Kristoffer Rypdal, Martin Rypdal, Manuel G, Scotto, Stéphane Vannitsem, Nicholas W. Watkins, Lichao Yang, Naiming Yuan","doi":"10.1029/2019RG000657","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<p>One of the most intriguing facets of the climate system is that it exhibits variability across all temporal and spatial scales; pronounced examples are temperature and precipitation. The structure of this variability, however, is not arbitrary. Over certain spatial and temporal ranges, it can be described by scaling relationships in the form of power laws in probability density distributions and autocorrelation functions. These scaling relationships can be quantified by scaling exponents which measure how the variability changes across scales and how the intensity changes with frequency of occurrence. Scaling determines the relative magnitudes and persistence of natural climate fluctuations. Here, we review various scaling mechanisms and their relevance for the climate system. We show observational evidence of scaling and discuss the application of scaling properties and methods in trend detection, climate sensitivity analyses, and climate prediction.</p>","PeriodicalId":21177,"journal":{"name":"Reviews of Geophysics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":25.2000,"publicationDate":"2020-03-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1029/2019RG000657","citationCount":"67","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Reviews of Geophysics","FirstCategoryId":"89","ListUrlMain":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2019RG000657","RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"地球科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"GEOCHEMISTRY & GEOPHYSICS","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 67
Abstract
One of the most intriguing facets of the climate system is that it exhibits variability across all temporal and spatial scales; pronounced examples are temperature and precipitation. The structure of this variability, however, is not arbitrary. Over certain spatial and temporal ranges, it can be described by scaling relationships in the form of power laws in probability density distributions and autocorrelation functions. These scaling relationships can be quantified by scaling exponents which measure how the variability changes across scales and how the intensity changes with frequency of occurrence. Scaling determines the relative magnitudes and persistence of natural climate fluctuations. Here, we review various scaling mechanisms and their relevance for the climate system. We show observational evidence of scaling and discuss the application of scaling properties and methods in trend detection, climate sensitivity analyses, and climate prediction.
期刊介绍:
Geophysics Reviews (ROG) offers comprehensive overviews and syntheses of current research across various domains of the Earth and space sciences. Our goal is to present accessible and engaging reviews that cater to the diverse AGU community. While authorship is typically by invitation, we warmly encourage readers and potential authors to share their suggestions with our editors.