Cloud influence on and response to seasonal Arctic sea ice loss

[1] Recent declines in Arctic sea ice extent provide new opportunities to assess cloud influence on and response to seasonal sea ice loss. This study combines unique satellite observations with complementary data sets to document Arctic cloud and atmospheric structure during summer and early fall. The analysis focuses on 2006–2008, a period over which ice extent plummeted to record levels, substantial variability in atmospheric circulation patterns occurred, and spaceborne radar and lidar observations of vertical cloud structure became available. The observations show that large-scale atmospheric circulation patterns, near-surface static stability, and surface conditions control Arctic cloud cover during the melt season. While no summer cloud response to sea ice loss was found, low clouds did form over newly open water during early fall. This seasonal variation in the cloud response to sea ice loss can be explained by near-surface static stability and air-sea temperature gradients. During summer, temperature inversions and weak air-sea temperature gradients limit atmosphere-ocean coupling. In contrast, relatively low static stability and strong air-sea gradients during early fall permit upward turbulent fluxes of moisture and heat and increased low cloud formation over newly open water. Because of their seasonal timing, cloud changes resulting from sea ice loss play a minor role in regulating ice-albedo feedbacks during summer, but may contribute to a cloud-ice feedback during early fall.

[1]  W. Paul Menzel,et al.  The MODIS cloud products: algorithms and examples from Terra , 2003, IEEE Trans. Geosci. Remote. Sens..

[2]  Axel Schweiger,et al.  Relationships between Arctic sea ice and clouds during autumn , 2008 .

[3]  J. Cassano,et al.  Impacts of reduced sea ice on winter Arctic atmospheric circulation, precipitation, and temperature , 2009 .

[4]  R. Goody,et al.  Formation and Persistence of Summertime Arctic Stratus Clouds. , 1976 .

[5]  Christopher D. Barnet,et al.  Validation of Atmospheric Infrared Sounder temperature and water vapor retrievals with matched radiosonde measurements and forecasts , 2006 .

[6]  Donald K. Perovich,et al.  Sunlight, water, and ice: Extreme Arctic sea ice melt during the summer of 2007 , 2008 .

[7]  S. Klein,et al.  The Seasonal Cycle of Low Stratiform Clouds , 1993 .

[8]  A. Barrett,et al.  The Summer Cyclone Maximum over the Central Arctic Ocean , 2005 .

[9]  C. Deser,et al.  The Effects of North Atlantic SST and Sea Ice Anomalies on the Winter Circulation in CCM3. Part II: Direct and Indirect Components of the Response , 2004 .

[10]  James O. Pinto,et al.  Mesoscale modeling of springtime Arctic mixed-phase stratiform clouds using a new two-moment bulk microphysics scheme , 2005 .

[11]  David M. Lawrence,et al.  The Seasonal Atmospheric Response to Projected Arctic Sea Ice Loss in the Late Twenty-First Century , 2010 .

[12]  Judith A. Curry,et al.  Overview of Arctic Cloud and Radiation Characteristics , 1996 .

[13]  Simone Tanelli,et al.  CloudSat mission: Performance and early science after the first year of operation , 2008 .

[14]  Ian A. Renfrew,et al.  The Effect of the Sea-ice Zone on the Development of Boundary-layer Roll Clouds During Cold Air Outbreaks , 2006 .

[15]  Andrew Gettelman,et al.  The contribution of cloud and radiation anomalies to the 2007 Arctic sea ice extent minimum , 2008 .

[16]  R. Marchand,et al.  A description of hydrometeor layer occurrence statistics derived from the first year of merged Cloudsat and CALIPSO data , 2009 .

[17]  Edgar L. Andreas,et al.  An annual cycle of Arctic surface cloud forcing at SHEBA : The surface heat budget of arctic ocen (SHEBA) , 2002 .

[18]  B. Walter.  Wintertime Observations of Roll Clouds over the Bering Sea , 1980 .

[19]  Gijs de Boer,et al.  Arctic Mixed-Phase Stratiform Cloud Properties from Multiple Years of Surface-Based Measurements at Two High-Latitude Locations , 2009 .

[20]  John E. Walsh,et al.  The Atmospheric Response to Realistic Arctic Sea Ice Anomalies in an AGCM during Winter. , 2004 .

[21]  Arun Kumar,et al.  Role of the Pacific‐North American (PNA) pattern in the 2007 Arctic sea ice decline , 2008 .

[22]  John E. Walsh,et al.  Arctic Sea Ice Variability in the Context of Recent Atmospheric Circulation Trends , 2000 .

[23]  R. Reynolds,et al.  The NCEP/NCAR 40-Year Reanalysis Project , 1996, Renewable Energy.

[24]  Andrew Gettelman,et al.  Relative humidity over Antarctica from radiosondes, satellites, and a general circulation model , 2006 .

[25]  M. Serreze,et al.  Characteristics of winter cyclone activity in the northern North Atlantic: Insights from observations and regional modeling , 2007 .

[26]  D. Lenschow,et al.  Arctic boundary layer in the fall season over open and frozen sea , 1997 .

[27]  John M. Wallace,et al.  Summer minimum Arctic sea ice extent and the associated summer atmospheric circulation , 2007 .

[28]  R. Marchand,et al.  Hydrometeor Detection Using Cloudsat—An Earth-Orbiting 94-GHz Cloud Radar , 2008 .

[29]  Steven A. Ackerman,et al.  Cloud Detection with MODIS. Part II: Validation , 2008 .

[30]  Larry Di Girolamo,et al.  A Cloud Fraction versus View Angle Technique for Automatic In-Scene Evaluation of the MISR Cloud Mask , 2004 .

[31]  Sungsu Park,et al.  Intercomparison of model simulations of mixed‐phase clouds observed during the ARM Mixed‐Phase Arctic Cloud Experiment. I: single‐layer cloud , 2009 .

[32]  D. Levinson,et al.  State of the Climate in 2007 , 2008 .

[33]  James J. Hack,et al.  A New Sea Surface Temperature and Sea Ice Boundary Dataset for the Community Atmosphere Model , 2008 .

[34]  Julienne C. Stroeve,et al.  Arctic Sea Ice Extent Plummets in 2007 , 2008 .

[35]  Marika M. Holland,et al.  Perspectives on the Arctic's Shrinking Sea-Ice Cover , 2007, Science.

[36]  Judith A. Curry,et al.  Review of Science Issues, Deployment Strategy, and Status for the ARM North Slope of Alaska–Adjacent Arctic Ocean Climate Research Site , 1999 .

[37]  Burghard Brümmer,et al.  Boundary-layer modification in wintertime cold-air outbreaks from the Arctic sea ice , 1996 .

[38]  Larry Di Girolamo,et al.  A first look at band-differenced angular signatures for cloud detection from MISR , 2003, IEEE Trans. Geosci. Remote. Sens..

[39]  James O. Pinto,et al.  Autumnal Mixed-Phase Cloudy Boundary Layers in the Arctic , 1998 .

[40]  Jan-Peter Muller,et al.  Operational retrieval of cloud-top heights using MISR data , 2002, IEEE Trans. Geosci. Remote. Sens..

[41]  Damian R. Wilson,et al.  Evaluating cloud systems in the Met Office global forecast model using simulated CloudSat radar reflectivities , 2008 .

[42]  Y. Zenou,et al.  Formation and Persistence of Oppositional Identities , 2011, European Economic Review.

[43]  Michael Steele,et al.  What drove the dramatic retreat of arctic sea ice during summer 2007? , 2008 .