Journal article
Atmospheric Moisture Measurements Explain Increases in Tropical Rainfall Extremes
TP Roderick, C Wasko, A Sharma
Geophysical Research Letters | AMER GEOPHYSICAL UNION | Published : 2019
DOI: 10.1029/2018GL080833
Abstract
Anthropogenic climate change is increasing extreme rainfall as a result of an increased water-holding capacity of the atmosphere due to higher temperatures. However, observed rainfall-temperature scaling relationships often differ from the theorized increases in moisture-holding capacity. This discrepancy is most evident in the tropics, where higher surface temperatures show a marked decrease in extreme rainfall intensity despite observed increases in extreme rainfall. Here we use atmospheric moisture measurements from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's Atmospheric Infrared Sounder with surface data to investigate the tropical rainfall-temperature scaling relationship. We sh..
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Funding Acknowledgements
Conrad Wasko acknowledges funding from the University of Melbourne McKenzie Fellowship scheme. This research was partially supported by the Australian Research Council. The authors thank Ditiro Moalafhi for assistance with AIRS data. Michael Roderick provided guidance and academic mentoring during the research and preparation of the paper. Surface rainfall and temperature data can be obtained from the Australian Bureau of Meteorology and can be found at www.bom.gov.au/climate/data/stations/. The AIRS data can be obtained from the NASA Goddard Earth Sciences Data Information and Services Center (GESDISC) and can be found at https://airs.jpl.nasa.gov/data/get_data.