SOI

Length of Day II

/ Paul Pukite (@whut) / 6 Comments

This is a continuation from the previous Length of Day post showing how closely the ENSO forcing aligns to the dLOD forcing.

Ding & Chao apply an AR-z technique as a supplement to Fourier and Max Entropy spectral techniques to isolate the tidal factors in dLOD

The red data points are the spectral values used in the ENSO model fit.

The top panel below is the LTE modulated tidal forcing fitted against the ENSO time series. The lower panel below is the tidal forcing model over a short interval overlaid on the dLOD/dt data.

That’s all there is to it — it’s all geophysical fluid dynamics. Essentially the same tidal forcing impacts both the rotating solid earth and the equatorial ocean, but the ocean shows a lagged nonlinear response as described in Chapter 12 of the book. In contrast, the solid earth shows an apparently direct linear inertial response. Bottom line is that if one doesn’t know how to do the proper GFD, one will never be able to fit ENSO to a known forcing.

The MJO

/ Paul Pukite (@whut) / 11 Comments

In Chapter 12 of the book, we presented a math model for the equatorial Pacific ocean dipole known as ENSO (El Nino /Southern Oscillation).  We argued that the higher wavenumber (×15 of the fundamental) characteristic of ENSO was related to the behavior known as Tropical Instability Waves (TIW). Taken together, the fundamental and TIW components provide enough detail to model ENSO at the monthly level. However if we drill deeper, especially with respect to the finer granularity SOI measure of ENSO, there are rather obvious cyclic factors in the 30 to 90 day range that can add even further detail. The remarkable aspect is that these appear to be related to the behavior known as the Madden-Julian Oscillation (MJO), identified originally as a 40-50 day oscillation in zonal wind [1].

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Implicit Interpolating Cross-Validation of ENSO

/ Paul Pukite (@whut) / 2 Comments

In Chapter 12 of the book, we describe the forcing mechanism behind the El Nino / Southern Oscillation (ENSO) behavior and here we continue to evaluate the rich dynamic behavior of the Southern Oscillation Index (SOI) — the pressure dipole measure of ENSO. In the following, we explore how the low-fidelity version of the SOI can reveal the high-frequency content via the solution to Laplace’s Tidal Equations.

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High Resolution Analysis of SOI

/ Paul Pukite (@whut) / 2 Comments

In Chapter 12 of the book, we have a description of the mechanism forcing the El Nino / Southern Oscillation (ENSO) behavior. ENSO shows a rich dynamic behavior, yet for the pressure dipole measure of ENSO, the Southern Oscillation Index (SOI), we find even greater richness in terms of it’s higher frequency components. Typically, SOI is presented with at least a 30-day moving average applied to the time-series to remove the higher-frequencies, but a daily time-series is also available for analysis dating back to 1991. The high-resolution analysis was not included in the book but we did  present the topic at last December’s AGU meeting.  What follows is an updated analysis …

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