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Full-Text Articles in Physical Sciences and Mathematics

Land Use Land Cover Change Effects On Southern Great Plains Precipitation, Alexandra Caruthers Dec 2017

Land Use Land Cover Change Effects On Southern Great Plains Precipitation, Alexandra Caruthers

Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Great Plains land use has changed substantially over the last 160 years, altering the properties of the land through increased settlement and advances in irrigation. Changing the interface between the land and atmosphere has implications for the atmospheric boundary layer, the regional circulation, the local surface energy budget and resulting precipitation patterns. Land use land cover (LULC) changes are an important topic for this region due to its heavy dependence on agriculture. This study investigates differences in Southern Great Plains precipitation patterns between four LULC scenarios: the pre-settlement, 1920’s, Dust Bowl and present day eras. Using the Weather Research and …


Impacts Of Internal Variability On Climate Trends In Large Ensemble Simulations By Two Climate Models, Christine Bloecker Jan 2017

Impacts Of Internal Variability On Climate Trends In Large Ensemble Simulations By Two Climate Models, Christine Bloecker

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Internal climate variability (ICV) can influence trends in observations and model simulations over periods spanning decades, making it difficult to quantify the response of the climate system to external forcing. We analyze two large ensembles of climate simulations from 1950-2100 by two fully coupled climate models, namely the CanESM2 and CESM1, to quantify the effects of ICV on apparent trends in annual surface air temperature (T) and precipitation (P) over different time periods and regions. In comparison with observations, the CanESM2 overestimates the global T and P trends during 1979-2014 while they fall within the ICV-induced range of the CESM1. …


Influence Of Volcanic Eruptions On Tropical Hydroclimate During The Last Millennium, Christopher Colose Jan 2017

Influence Of Volcanic Eruptions On Tropical Hydroclimate During The Last Millennium, Christopher Colose

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Volcanic eruptions exert the most important radiative forcing on Earth’s climate during the pre-industrial interval of the last millennium. In this thesis, I investigate the role of volcanic eruptions in altering tropical climate, including temperature and rainfall. I primarily use forced transient simulations of the last millennium as a tool to explore how explosive volcanic events project onto the hydrologic cycle, as well as the imprint of water isotopologues (H216O, H218O) associated with rainfall. Attention is given to the South American continent specifically (in chapter 2), and to the entire tropics (in chapter 3).