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| Collaborative Research: Linking the Long-Term Congo Drought to Changes in Walker-Type Circulations Affecting Equatorial Africa | |
| 项目编号 | 1854486 |
| Liming Zhou | |
| 项目主持机构 | SUNY at Albany |
| 开始日期 | 2019-08-01 |
| 结束日期 | 07/31/2023 |
| 英文摘要 | The Basin of the Congo river is home to the second largest rainforest in the world, which sustains a growing population and an abundance of plant and animal species. Despite its size, population, and importance as a biodiversity hotspots, the rainforest is not well represented in the climate research literature, particularly compared to the larger but less populous Amazon rainforest. In particular, recent short-term Amazon droughts have drawn worldwide attention to the vulnerability of tropical forests, but the Congo Basin has been in drought for several decades. The Congo Basin receives less rainfall than the Amazon, and paleoclimate data suggests that it has experienced dramatic forest loss during previous dry periods. The importance and potential vulnerability of the Congo rainforest thus motivate further study of the mechanisms which regulate climate and rainfall in the region. Work performed here seeks to determine the causes of the rainfall deficits in the region, in particular the extent to which they are driven by increases in the sea surface temperature (SST) of the adjacent oceans. Near-equatorial SST changes can affect continental precipitation through their effects on the large-scale atmospheric overturning circulations known as Walker cells. The research team will test the hypothesis that the drought is primarily due to SST increases in the Indian and Western Pacific oceans, which result in an intensified and westward-shifted Walker cell, which in turn induces subsidence over the Congo and reduces moisture transport into it. The research is conducted using a combination of observational data and model simulations. The team will take advantage of a rain gauge-based precipitation dataset for the Congo and surrounding regions from 1921 to 2014, compiled by one of the PIs under previous NSF support. Model simulations are performed using a fully-coupled atmosphere-ocean climate model, an atmosphere-only model with prescribed SSTs, and a "pacemaker" configuration in which SST is specified over a particular ocean region (say, the equatorial Indian ocean), but the coupled model determines its own SST outside the region. The work has broader impacts due to the importance and vulnerability of the Congo Basin rainforest, as noted above. A particular concern is that the SST increases in the Indian and Western Pacific Oceans may be due to anthropogenic greenhouse warming, in which case the rainfall reductions are unlikely to reverse. Results are communicated to African climate communities and non-profit organizations for use in climate impact assessments and the formulation of adaptation strategies. In addition, the project provides support and training to two graduate students and one undergraduate. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria. |
| 资助机构 | US-NSF |
| 项目经费 | $598,447.00 |
| 项目类型 | Standard Grant |
| 国家 | US |
| 语种 | 英语 |
| 文献类型 | 项目 |
| 条目标识符 | http://gcip.llas.ac.cn/handle/2XKMVOVA/212995 |
| 推荐引用方式 GB/T 7714 | Liming Zhou.Collaborative Research: Linking the Long-Term Congo Drought to Changes in Walker-Type Circulations Affecting Equatorial Africa.2019. |
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