During the late Quaternary period, a series of abrupt climate changes in the tropics and sub-tropics driven by changes in ocean circulation were both dramatic and disruptive.
Precipitation
Posted inEditors' Highlights
Raising Central American Orography Improves Climate Simulation
Elevation of Central American orography significantly reduces the pervasive tropical rainfall bias by blocking the easterlies and consequently warming the northeastern tropical Pacific.
Posted inNews
Climate Clues from One of the Rainiest Places on Earth
One of the world’s rainiest places lies off Colombia’s Pacific coast. New field research sheds light on the Chocó low-level jet, a phenomenon responsible for the region’s precipitation.
Posted inNews
Severe Hailstorms Are Costly and Hard to Predict
Hail causes huge financial losses worldwide every year. But we still can’t predict when hail will strike. Climate scientists from around the world are teaming up to figure out how to change that.
Posted inEditors' Highlights
New Global Mesoscale Convective System Tracking Database
A 20-year high-resolution global mesoscale convective system tracking database reveals the characteristics of mesoscale convective systems and their significant contributions to global rainfall.
Posted inEditors' Highlights
Upwind Forest Buffers Rondonia Cropland Against Regional Drought
During severe Amazonia droughts when oceanic supply of moisture failed, the magnitude of rainfall reduction over Rondonia was moderated by enhanced moisture supply from upwind forests.
Posted inEditors' Vox
Summer Monsoons: Regional Manifestations of a Global System
New insights from observations and theory suggest that the essential drivers of Earth’s summer monsoons are not as obvious as was previously thought.
Posted inEditors' Highlights
Devastation of Hurricane Maria to Puerto Rican Landscape
The destructive winds and rain of Hurricane Maria in 2017 caused a dramatic transformation to Puerto Rico’s landscape and altered the characteristics of land-air interaction.
Posted inResearch Spotlights
How Heavy Rain and Drought Influence California Crustal Strain
New research using continuous GPS data reveals how multiyear precipitation patterns can amplify the effects of hydrological loading on crustal deformation.
Posted inNews
Dirty Trees Shape Earth’s Hydrologic and Carbon Cycles
Researchers peer into precipitation partitioning—the process by which plants and the organic matter coating them help shape the hydrologic cycle.