Close to 150 scientists from more than 40 universities in nine countries are starting a coordinated program aimed at gaining new insights into the Earth's climate and the complex, interconnected system involving the oceans, the atmosphere and land.
A coordinated program that is
designed to gain new insights about the earth’s climate and the complex, interconnected system that involves oceans, the atmosphere and the land has been created.
The program involves 150 scientists from more than 40 countries in a study of the southeastern Pacific Ocean, the marine area off South America's west coast. This is a region where the interplay among low clouds, strong low-level winds, coastal ocean currents, surfacing of deep water, the Andes Mountains, aerosols and other factors shape the regional climate and affect global weather in ways that are poorly understood.
"Our research should produce a better understanding of the southeast Pacific Ocean system and improve our global computer climate models, which would lead to more confidence in climate forecasts, including predictions about global warming," said UCLA professor of atmospheric and oceanic sciences C. Roberto Mechoso, who chairs the program, known as VOCALS (VAMOS Ocean-Cloud-Atmosphere-Land Study).
"Models currently used for climate change studies have systematic errors concerning the southeastern Pacific Ocean, and because the models are not accurate for such an extensive area, the El Niños they produce in the Pacific are questionable as well. We hope our research will get rid of, or at least greatly decrease, these uncertainties."
Rainfall and temperature worldwide are affected by variations in the southeast Pacific climate either directly or indirectly, Mechoso believes, but how the system works is not well understood and therefore cannot be modeled or predicted accurately.
"Despite its great importance to the Earth's climate system, the ocean-cloud-atmosphere-land system in the southeast Pacific has been sparsely observed," Mechoso said. "With VOCALS, that will change drastically."
VOCALS is designed to increase our understanding of how much global warming will occur, and over what period of time it will take place.
"Absolutely," said Mechoso, an expert on El Niño who studies the coasts of Ecuador, Peru and Chile. "We may also produce a better understanding of the dynamics of El Niño. The relation between the eastern Pacific and El Niño is strong. El Niño develops in the eastern Pacific, so when the eastern Pacific is not well represented in climate models, El Niño is not well represented in the models either."
There is a scientific modeling program within VOCALS, headed by Mechoso, which seeks to improve model simulations of key climate processes, and an experimental field component, headed by Robert Wood, assistant professor of atmospheric sciences at the University of Washington.
The intent is to measure, by using four aircraft and two research ships containing scientific instruments, how thick and deep the clouds are, where and why they open, and a variety of other elements to answer key scientific questions related to the climate system of the southeast Pacific region.
Currently there is one ship is from the United States and another from Peru; the scientists expect another ship from either Chile or Ecuador.
"There is tremendous analysis and modeling work that will go along with the field project," Mechoso said.
VOCALS will begin operation in January 2008 with a budget of more than $16 million and will continue for three to five years. 2008. The field program will begin in October 2008 off the coasts of Chile and Peru.
"I believe we have the right questions and the right hypotheses to guide our work," Mechoso said. "We will learn how the southeastern Pacific Ocean system works and find out ways to improve the performance of our climate models."
According to the
press release, Mechoso's own research project within VOCALS operates in collaboration with the National Center for Environmental Prediction. The project aims to improve the model that is used by the United States for seasonal climate prediction.
The "V" in VOCALS represents an acronym: VAMOS, or Variability of the American Monsoon Systems. Mechoso was the first chair of this panel of the World Climate Research Program, which identified the eastern Pacific as an area where improvement in climate models is essential.
In addition, the researchers are trying to learn more about the role of aerosol in cloud behavior and climate.
"The role of aerosol in climate is very complex and we are working very hard to capture aerosol effects in climate models," Mechoso said.
