The Hadley circulation in the Pangea era

Abstract

The Pangea era is an exceptional phase in Earth’s history. It is characterized by its hothouse climate state and the latest supercontinent. Thus, it is expected that atmospheric circulation in the Pangea era was largely different from that of the modern world. Here, we study the Hadley circulation in the Pangea era and compare it with that of the present, by performing climate simulations. Our results show that the annual mean Hadley cells are about 20% and 45% weaker than that in the pre-industrial (PI) climate, and their poleward edges are about 2° wider in latitude. The austral winter cell is weakened by 27% and expanded by 2.6°, while the changes of the boreal winter cell are not significant. One distinctive feature is that the ascending branches of the boreal and austral winter cells shift to 23°S and 18°N, respectively, which are much more poleward than their present locations. Our analyses demonstrate that the weakening and widening of the Hadley circulation is due to increasing tropical and subtropical static stability, and that the poleward shifts of the ascending branches of the winter cells are associated with the geographic configuration of the supercontinent Pangea.