%0 Journal Article
%T Contribution of El Ni£¿o amplitude change to tropical Pacific precipitation decline in the late 1990s
%A Renguang WU
%A Suqi GUO
%J Atmospheric and Oceanic Science Letters
%D 2019
%R https://doi.org/10.1080/16742834.2019.1633230
%X ABSTRACT Equatorial central Pacific precipitation experienced a prominent decline in the late 1990s. This change was previously attributed to a La Ni£¿a-like mean sea surface temperature (SST) change in the Pacific Ocean associated with a phase switch of the Interdecadal Pacific Oscillation. Here, using a series of model experiments, the authors reveal that the El Ni£¿o-related interannual SST anomalies contributed largely to the precipitation decrease over the equatorial central Pacific. This El Ni£¿o SST effect was due to the change in the amplitude of El Ni£¿o events in the late 1990s. The 1980¨C98 decade had more large-amplitude El Ni£¿o events than the 1999¨C2014 decade. The nonlinear precipitation response to SST anomalies resulted in a larger decadal mean precipitation in the 1980¨C98 decade than in the 1999¨C2014 decade. The results highlight the importance of El Ni£¿o amplitude change in future climate change related to global warming. Graphical Abstrac
%U https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/16742834.2019.1633230