Water vapor intraseasonal variability over northern Northeast Brazil and the southern hemisphere summer: present climate and future projections

• Grant number: 11/09314-2
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Doctorate
• Start date: November 01, 2011
• End date: May 31, 2014
• Field of knowledge: Physical Sciences and Mathematics - Geosciences - Meteorology
• Principal Investigator: Adilson Wagner Gandu
• Grantee: Francisco das Chagas Vasconcelos Júnior
• Host Institution: Instituto de Astronomia, Geofísica e Ciências Atmosféricas (IAG). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). São Paulo , SP, Brazil
• Associated scholarship(s): 13/09642-5 - Relations between high precipitation events in the northern Northeast Brazil and the role of the Madden-Julian oscillation, BE.EP.DR

Abstract

Northeast Brazil is vulnerable to climate variability and climate change as water play an important societal and economic role in that region. Northeast Brazil precipitation presents a significant space and time variability and, in current climate, is characterized by a short wet season, mainly associated with southward displacement of the Intertropical convergence zone (ITCZ), during austral summer and fall. Interannual variations in the ITCZ position are mostly driven by sea surface temperature anomaly patterns. The north of Northeast Brazil presents a pre-wet season due to cold fronts from higher latitudes, some authors correlated rainfall events on this period or SST patterns on adjacent oceans with the precipitation amount in subsequent months. Many works show the importance of water vapor balance on Northeast of Brazil on interannual scale, showing that this region is a sink of water vapor in wet years and source in dry years. Water vapor stands out as one of the most important components in the cycles global and hydrological, and it's considered an agent that plays an essential role in atmospheric processes in the tropical region. This way, the analyzes of the dynamic and thermodynamic patterns which precede the wet season could give some information about the subsequent period. This work will analyze thermodynamic-dynamic factors over Brazil's Northeast northern, beyond water vapor balance and temporal variations in the intrasazonal scale, trying to aim information about onset, demise and "quality" of wet season for the present climate and, based on numerical projections of climate changing, for the future climate over the twenty-first century. (AU)

Scientific publications

(References retrieved automatically from Web of Science and SciELO through information on FAPESP grants and their corresponding numbers as mentioned in the publications by the authors)

VASCONCELOS JUNIOR, FRANCISCO DAS CHAGAS; JONES, CHARLES; GANDU, ADILSON W.; MARTINS, EDUARDO SAVIO P. R.. Impacts of the Madden-Julian Oscillation on the intensity and spatial extent of heavy precipitation events in northern Northeast Brazil. INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF CLIMATOLOGY, v. 41, n. 6, FEB 2021. (13/09642-5, 11/09314-2)

FRANCISCO DAS CHAGAS VASCONCELOS JUNIOR; CHARLES JONES; ADILSON WAGNER GANDU. Variações Interanuais e Intrasazonais do Início e do Fim da Pré-Estação Chuvosa e da Estação Chuvosa no Norte do Nordeste do Brasil. Revista Brasileira de Meteorologia, v. 33, n. 3, p. 472-484, 2018-09-00. (11/09314-2, 13/09642-5)