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Relative roles of the Arctic and Antarctic sea ice melt on Indian summer monsoon

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Abstract

The response of low-latitude weather and climate to polar sea ice melt is not well understood. In this study, we run a suite of fully coupled simulations using the Community Earth System Model to investigate the effects of polar sea ice melt on Indian summer monsoon (ISM). In the coupled model simulation, the albedo of the sea ice is reduced in such a way that the increased absorption of the solar radiation would melt the sea ice. The effects of the Arctic and Antarctic sea ice melts on the ISM have been examined. The findings reveal that the combined melting of sea ice in the Arctic and Antarctic exerts a stronger influence on the ISM compared to the melting at a single pole. Specifically, the ISM exhibits a relatively weak sensitivity to the Arctic sea ice melt, while showing a stronger response to sea ice melt over the Antarctic and the combined melt over both poles. The response of summer monsoon to sea ice melt is characterized by a weakening of the circulation and a decrease in the continental precipitation, indicating an overall weakening of the monsoon system as a result of the polar sea ice melt. The intertropical convergence zone (ITCZ) and associated precipitation pattern shift equatorward in the sea ice melt experiments.

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Acknowledgements

S. Sandeep acknowledges the financial support by National Center for Polar and Ocean Research, Ministry of Earth Sciences (Government of India), under the PACER Outreach Programme (NCPOR/2019/PACER-POP/OS-04), to undertake this research. The model simulations are performed on the high performance computer at IIT Delhi.

Funding

S. Sandeep is funded by the Ministry of Earth Sciences (Government of India), through the grant NCPOR/2019/PACER-POP/OS-04.

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  1. Centre for Atmospheric Sciences, Indian Institute of Technology Delhi, Hauz Khas, New Delhi, 110016, India

    Varunesh Chandra & S. Sandeep

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  1. Varunesh Chandra
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SS conceptualised and designed the study; VC designed and performed the model simulations, data analysis and plotted figures. Both authors interpreted the results and contributed to the writing of the paper.

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Correspondence to Varunesh Chandra.

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Chandra, V., Sandeep, S. Relative roles of the Arctic and Antarctic sea ice melt on Indian summer monsoon. Clim Dyn (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00382-024-07167-5

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