A Land-Sea Contrast Pattern in Surface Temperature and Atmospheric Circulation Trends in Recent Decades
Year: 2026
Type: preprint
Abstract: We argue land-sea contrast is an important driver of spatial patterns of observed surface temperature and atmospheric circulation trends, including the negative Inter-Decadal Pacific Oscillation (IPO)-like tendency across the Pacific basin. Observed and modeled trends display an overall decline in sea level pressure over the faster-warming land, with a spatial pattern that resembles the seasonal cycle and modeled response to land heating. Coupled historical forcing climate model simulations underestimate the land-sea warming ratio. It is only in the early response of abrupt CO2 quadrupling climate model simulations that climate models are able to recreate the observed land-sea warming ratio, in which case a negative IPO-like sea level pressure trend and surface warming pattern over the Pacific comparable to observed trends are seen. We propose that some discrepancies between observed trends and those predicted by climate models are explained by the underestimation of the land-sea warming ratio by climate models.
Source: arXiv (Cornell University)
Authors: Johnson, Benjamin O., Rugenstein, Maria
Institution: Colorado State University
Language: English
Subfield: Global and Planetary Change
Field: Environmental Science
Domain: Physical Sciences
SDG: Climate action
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W7165377442