Citation
Thayer, J. P., & Livingston, J. M. (2008). Observations of wintertime arctic mesosphere cooling associated with stratosphere baroclinic zones. Geophysical research letters, 35(18).
Abstract
A regional wintertime mesosphere cooling of 30–40 K is observed over the Sondrestrom facility near Kangerlussuaq, Greenland (67.0°N, 309.1°E) during multiple weeks in December 2000 where temperatures from the ground to 90 km were uniquely observed. The negative excursions in mesosphere temperature were observed during times when no thermal changes are observed below 10 hPa (∼30 km), but strong temperature changes are observed above this pressure surface. These thermal features are associated with middle atmosphere disturbances that may occur prior to, or independently of, major stratospheric warmings. They are regionally confined, deviate significantly from ambient conditions, and are likely caused by adiabatic cooling/heating due to strong vertical velocities. We propose that these types of mesosphere cooling events are related to stratospheric baroclinic zones and a Q-vector analysis of stratospheric geopotential and temperature fields can be used to help identify and describe regional occurrences of significant cooling in the mesosphere.
