A selection of new science articles from the past week of interest to the SPARC community (a SPARC Office choice).

Overview of experiment design and comparison of models participating in phase 1 of the SPARC Quasi-Biennial Oscillation initiative (QBOi). By N. Butchart et al. in Geoscientific Model Development.

How Sudden Stratospheric Warming Affects the Whole Atmosphere. By N.M. Pedatella et al. in Earth & Space Science News.

Spring Arctic Atmospheric Preconditioning: Do Not Rule Out Shortwave Radiation Just Yet. By J. Sedlar in the Journal of Climate.

Discussion papers – open for comment

Requirements for a global data infrastructure in support of CMIP6. By V. Balaji et al. in Geoscientific Model Development Discussions.

WMO GAW is currently seeking input on the draft publication entitled Low-cost sensors for the measurement of atmospheric composition: overview of topic and future applications. Comments will be accepted until 31 March 2018.

To turn in comments, please use the excel spread sheet from the link below and send your comments via email to

Download draft (PDF)

Download comment file (MS Excel)

A selection of new science articles from the past week of interest to the SPARC community (a SPARC Office choice).

MJO prediction skill of the subseasonal-to-seasonal prediction models. By Y. Lim, S-W Son, and D. Kim in the Journal of Climate.

Northern Hemisphere Stratospheric Ozone Depletion Caused by Solar Proton Events: The Role of the Polar Vortex. By M.H. Denton et al. in the Geophysical Research Letters.

Rossby Wave Propagation into the Northern Hemisphere Stratosphere: The Role of Zonal Phase Speed. By D.I.V. Domeisen, O. Martius, and B. Jiménez-Esteve. In the Geophysical Research Letters.

Does extreme El Niño have a different effect on the stratosphere in boreal winter than its moderate counterpart? By X. Zhou et al. in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres.

On the Origin of the Solar Cycle Modulation of the Southern Annular Mode. By Y. Kuroda in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres.

On the Linkage Between the Asian Summer Monsoon and Tropopause Folds. By Y. Wu et al. in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres.

Discussion papers – open for comment

Gravity Waves excited during a Minor Sudden Stratospheric Warming. By A. Dörnbrack et al. in Atmospheric Chemsitry and Physics Discussions.

Polar stratospheric cloud climatology based on CALIPSO spaceborne lidar measurements from 2006–2017. By M.C. Pitts, L.R. Poole, and R. Gonzalez in Atmospheric Chamistry and Physics Discussions.

Limited angle tomography of mesoscale gravity waves by the infrared limb-sounder GLORIA. By I. kirsch et al. in Atmospheric Measurement Techniques Discussions.

The 20th Conference on the Middle Atmosphere will take place 6-10 January 2019 in Phoenix, Arizona at the AMS annual meeting.  We are asking if you would please consider proposing a session topic.  The deadline is April 1st.  If you think your proposed session would be a good candidate for a joint session with another conference (such as Climate Variability and Change or Atmospheric Chemistry), please make a note in the Comments section.

Submission portal: https://ams.confex.com/ams/2019Annual/cfs.cgi

Submission deadline: 1 April

We hope to see you in Phoenix next January!

Amy Butler and Sean Davis (co-organizers)

A selection of new science articles from the past week of interest to the SPARC community (a SPARC Office choice).

Changes in stratospheric transport and mixing during sudden stratospheric warmings. By A. de la Cámara, M. Abalos, and P. Hitchcock in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres.

Downward Wave Coupling between the Stratosphere and Troposphere under Future Anthropogenic Climate Change. By S.W. Lubis et al in the Journal of Climate.

Atmospheric QBO and ENSO indices with high vertical resolution from GNSS radio occultation temperature measurements. By H. Wilhelmsen et al. in Atmospheric Measurement Techniques.

Verification in the presence of observation errors: Bayesian point of view. By L. Duc and K. Saito in the Quaterly Journal of the Royal meteorological Society.

Dynamical core in atmospheric model does matter in the simulation of Arctic climate. By S.-Y. Jun, S.-J. Choi, and B.-M. Kim in the Geophysical Research Letters.

QBO-MJO Connection. By C. Zhang, and B. Zhang in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres.

Implications of potential future grand solar minimum for ozone layer and climate. By P. Arsenovic et al. in Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics.

The International Commission on Atmospheric Chemistry and Global Pollution (iCACGP) invites nominations for the Paul Crutzen Award for early career scientists 2018.

Details about the prize and nomination procedure can be found here (download PDF).

The deadline for submission of the full package of nominations is the 10 June 2018. The decision will be announced by mid-July 2018.

The Joint Scientific Committee (JSC) of the World Climate Research Programme (WCRP) provides scientific guidance in all aspects of the World Climate Research Programme, in line with the overall aims and interests of the sponsoring organizations.

For the upcoming membership term, from January 2019 to December 2022, (self-)nominations are sought from the global climate research community. JSC members are to be selected for their scientific knowledge, capability and breadth of vision. The JSC aims to be an inclusive source of leadership for international climate research and seeks nominations of mid- to senior-career researchers from around the globe. The deadline to submit nominations is 6 April 2018.

The membership of the JSC shall aim to include a balanced representation of relevant disciplines in atmospheric, oceanic, hydrological and polar sciences. The JSC guides the overarching objectives and priorities of WCRP, in agreement with the sponsoring organizations and the WCRP sponsors’ agreement (subject to any future revisions thereof through the sponsoring organizations), as well as in line with the upcoming WCRP Strategic and Implementation Plans.

Target expertise:

• Climate Policy
• Climate Services
• Climate Risk
• Scenario Development
• Tropical Climate
• Climate System Modelling
• Sea level Change
• Seasonal Prediction
• Decadal Prediction
• Oceanography
• Hydrology
• Atmospheric Chemistry
• Terrestrial System and/or Ecology
• Biogeochemistry
• Predictability
• Extremes Across Timescales
• Climate Observations and Data Systems
• Cryosphere
• Stratospheric Dynamics

Please submit self-nominations by Friday 6 April 2018 using the following google form: https://goo.gl/Gjg7JA

A selection of new science articles from the past week of interest to the SPARC community (a SPARC Office choice).

Predictability of Sudden Stratospheric Warmings in the ECMWF extended range forecast system. By A.Y. Karpechko in the Monthly Waether Review.

The Extrapolar SWIFT model (version 1.0): fast stratospheric ozone chemistry for global climate models. By D. Kreyling et al. in Geoscientific Model Development.

Historical tropospheric and stratospheric ozone radiative forcing using the CMIP6 database. By R.Checa-Garcia et al. in the Geophysical Research Letters.

Climate Models Are Uncertain, but We Can Do Something About It. By K.S. Carslaw, et al. in EOS.

First Successful Hindcasts of the 2016 Disruption of the Stratospheric Quasi-biennial Oscillation. By S. Watanabe et al. in the Geophysical Research Letters.

Statistical analysis of inertial gravity wave parameters in the lower stratosphere over Northern China. By L. Chen, et al. in Climate Dynamics.

The Effects of Deep Convection on Regional Temperature Structure in the Tropical Upper Troposphere and Lower Stratosphere. By B.R. Johnston, F. Xie, and C. Liu in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres.

First Reprocessing of Southern Hemisphere ADditional OZonesondes (SHADOZ) Profile Records: 3. Uncertainty in Ozone Profile and Total Column. By J.C. Witte et al. in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres.

At the conclusion of 2018, four members of the IGAC Scientific Steering Committee (SSC) will reach the end of their terms of service on the committee: Co-chair Mark Lawrence (IASS, Germany), Colette Heald (MIT, USA), Alastair Lewis (University of York, UK), and Noureddine Yassaa (CDER, Algeria).

IGAC is accepting nominations to replace these excellent four outgoing SSC members. In addition, IGAC is looking to increase the size of its SSC by an additional 1-2 people. Nominations from Asian countries, as well as other regions of the world, not currently represent on the IGAC SSC are highly encouraged.  If you wish to submit a nomination for a SSC membership (three-year term starts 1 January 2019), please fill out this online form and upload the nominees CV by 20 April 2018. Self-nominations are welcome.

Please keep in mind that IGAC strives to have a SSC with diversity in geographical representation, gender, and expertise. To view current SSC members and their expertise, visit igacproject.org/people.

For more information on the role and expectations of SSC members, please feel free to contact the IGAC Executive Officer, Megan L. Melamed ().

A selection of new science articles from the past week of interest to the SPARC community (a SPARC Office choice).

Role of Finite-Amplitude Rossby Waves and Nonconservative Processes in Downward Migration of Extratropical Flow Anomalies. By S.W. Lubis, C.S.Y. Huang, and N. Nakamura in the Journal of the Atmospheric Sciences.

Recently amplified arctic warming has contributed to a continual global warming trend. By J. Huang et al. in Nature Climate Change.

Current sources of carbon tetrachloride (CCl4) in our atmosphere. By D. Sherry et al. in the Environmental Research Letters.

An intercomparison of stratospheric gravity wave potential energy densities from METOP GPS radio occultation measurements and ECMWF model data. By M. Rapp et al. in Atmospheric Measurement Techniques.

Optimizing the Definition of a Sudden Stratospheric Warming. By A.H. Butler and E.P. Gerber in the Journal of Climate.

Lower-stratospheric control of the frequency of sudden stratospheric warming events. By P. Martineau et al. in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres.

The Role of Zonal Asymmetry in the Enhancement and Suppression of Sudden Stratospheric Warming Variability by the Madden–Julian Oscillation. By W. Kang and E. Tziperman in the Journal of Climate.

On the interaction of observation and prior error correlations in data assimilation. By A.M. Fowler, S.L. Dance, and J.A. Waller in the Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society.

On the reproducibility of the September 2002 vortex splitting event in the Antarctic stratosphere achieved without satellite observations. By S. Noguchi and C. Kobayashi in the Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society.

Synoptic Formation of Double Tropopauses. By C. Liu and E. Barnes in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres.

On the Climate Impacts of Upper Tropospheric and Lower Stratospheric Ozone. By Y. Xia, Y. Huang, and Y. Hu in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres.

MJO-Related Intraseasonal Variation in the Stratosphere: Gravity Waves and Zonal Winds. By M.J. Alexander et al. in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres.

Discussion papers – open for comment

Impact of tropical lower stratospheric cooling on deep convective activity: (I) Recent trends in tropical circulation. By K. Kodera et al. in Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics Discussions.