The effect of the Zagros Mountains on the formation and maintenance of the Iran Anticyclone using RegCM4

Abstract

Iran anticyclone is one of the main features of the summer circulation over the Middle East in the middle and upper troposphere. To examine the effect of the Zagros Mountains on the formation and maintenance of the Iran anticyclone, an experiment was conducted by Regional Climate Model (RegCM4) in an area between 22°–44°N and 35°–70°E with a 40 km horizontal grid spacing. The NCEP/NCAR re-analysis data set were used to provide the initial and lateral boundary conditions in a control run and in a simulation run by removing the Zagros Mountains. The result reveals that the Zagros Mountains have an important effect on the formation and maintenance of the low-level cyclonic circulation and mid-level anticyclonic circulation in summer. Examining the diabatic heating shows that the elimination of the Zagros Mountains causes a significant change in the heating values and its spatial distributions over the study area. Comparing the diabatic heating terms, the vertical advection term has the main contribution to the total heating. In the absence of the Zagros Mountains, the vertical advection and the mid-troposphere anticyclonic circulation are apparently weak and, therefore, the Iran subtropical anticyclone vanishes over the west of Iran. The study indicates that the Zagros Mountains as an elevated heat source have the main impact in the formation of a thermally driven circulation over the Middle East.