Modulation of the Impacts of the Indian Ocean Basin Mode on Tropical Cyclones over the Northwest Pacific during the Boreal Summer by La Niña Modoki

Abstract

AbstractThis paper investigates how La Niña Modoki modulates the impacts of the warm Indian Ocean basin mode (IOBM) on the boreal summer climate and the genesis of tropical cyclones (TCs) over the northwest Pacific (NWP). The results showed that the influence of the Indian Ocean sea surface temperature (SST) on TC genesis is the primary mechanism during the boreal summer, while La Niña Modoki exerts a secondary influence. However, although the summertime index of the IOBM shows a high negative correlation with the number of TCs generated over the NWP, warm IOBM events without La Niña Modoki have only limited influences on the boreal summertime circulations and TC genesis. The present study showed that when warm IOBM events and La Niña Modoki coexisted, the average location of TC genesis shifted westward, and the annual number of generated TCs substantially decreased. La Niña Modoki–related cold sea surface temperature anomalies over the central Pacific further suppressed convective activities over the eastern NWP compared with warm IOBM events without La Niña Modoki. Upper-level convergence and enlarged tropospheric vertical wind shears both contributed to the weakening of the low-level relative vorticity in the coupled cases, leading to a suppressed NWP monsoon trough. Additionally, together with the weaker moisture supply, the impacts of warm IOBM cases were significantly enhanced under the modulation of La Niña Modoki, leading to poorer TC genesis conditions over the eastern NWP. In addition, the energy conversion processes in the aforementioned modulation showed that joint cases will provide fewer initial disturbance seedlings for TC genesis. These results are useful for further understanding the role of warm IOBM cases in TC genesis over the NWP.