期刊名称:Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
印刷版ISSN:0027-8424
电子版ISSN:1091-6490
出版年度:2020
卷号:117
期号:45
页码:27884-27892
DOI:10.1073/pnas.2013584117
出版社:The National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
摘要:The tall clouds that comprise tropical storms, hurricanes, and typhoons—or more generally, tropical cyclones (TCs)—are highly effective at trapping the infrared radiation welling up from the surface. This cloud–infrared radiation feedback, referred to as the “cloud greenhouse effect,” locally warms the lower–middle troposphere relative to a TC’s surroundings through all stages of its life cycle. Here, we show that this effect is essential to promoting and accelerating TC development in the context of two archetypal storms—Super Typhoon Haiyan (2013) and Hurricane Maria (2017). Namely, this feedback strengthens the thermally direct transverse circulation of the developing storm, in turn both promoting saturation within its core and accelerating the spin-up of its surface tangential circulation through angular momentum convergence. This feedback therefore shortens the storm’s gestation period prior to its rapid intensification into a strong hurricane or typhoon. Further research into this subject holds the potential for key progress in TC prediction, which remains a critical societal challenge.