UM Scientists Research Clues to Worldwide Weather Patterns

Home ' Newsroom ' Press Releases ' Scientists from Univ. of Miami probe Indian Ocean for Clues to Worldwide Weather Patterns MIAMI — September 22, 2011 — Faculty, graduate students, and research scientists from the Rosenstiel School of Marine & Atmospheric Science at the University of Miami will join an international team of researchers in the Indian Ocean for six months to study how tropical weather brews over the region and moves eastward along the equator, with reverberating effects around the entire globe. The field campaign, known as DYNAMO (Dynamics of the Madden-Julian Oscillation), will take place from October 2011 to March 2012. It will help improve long-range weather forecasts and seasonal outlooks and enable scientists to further refine computer models of global climate. "The Madden-Julian Oscillation has a huge impact all over the globe," says Chidong Zhang, University of Miami Professor of Meteorology and Physical Oceanography, and DYNAMO chief scientist. "It connects weather and climate, and it is important to forecasting both of them." The overriding goal is to better understand a disturbance of the tropics, known as the Madden-Julian Oscillation, or MJO. This disturbance, which originates in the equatorial Indian Ocean roughly every 30 to 90 days, is directly linked to Asian and Australian monsoons, can trigger torrential rainfall at the west coast of North America, and affect the onset of El Niño.