On the influence of the 11-year cycle of solar activity on quasi-biennial variations in ozone and temperature in the Canadian sector of the arctic

Abstract

An analysis of the high-latitude ozone balloon sounding data derived from Canadian stations shows that, in the maximum of the 11-year cycle of solar activity (SA), the ozone content in the lower stratosphere is higher than in the SA minimum and, in the SA maximum, the lower stratosphere is warmer and the troposphere is colder than in the SA minimum. The ozone and temperature responses to the equatorial quasi-biennial oscillation (QBO) in the opposite phases of the 11-year cycle of SA show substantial differences: in the SA maximum, the QBO effects in the ozone and temperature cover a wider range of heights, the maxima of the effects manifest themselves at 5–10 km higher, and their amplitudes exceed the amplitudes of the effects in the SA minimum. The results indicate that the QBO is one of the “conductors” of the influence of the 11-year SA cycle in the Canadian sector of the Arctic.