Impact of Inter‐Basin Interactions on ENSO‐Associated Hadley Circulation Adjustments

Abstract El Niño events are usually accompanied by Hadley circulation (HC) adjustment extending beyond the Pacific to the Atlantic and Indian Oceans. These remote HC adjustments arise through both pure atmospheric and ocean‐atmosphere coupling mechanisms, yet their relative importance remains unclear. In this study, we integrate observations with climate model experiments to assess the roles of pure atmospheric and coupled ocean‐atmosphere pathways linking ENSO to the global HC adjustments. Results show that El Niño intensifies deep convection over the Pacific but suppresses convection over the Atlantic and Indian Oceans via the tropospheric temperature mechanism. Meanwhile, El Niño‐induced Atlantic and Indian Oceans warming enhances convection and regional HC. These two pathways exert opposing influences, with pure atmospheric pathway as the dominant driver. These findings establish a novel inter‐basin dynamical perspective for ENSO‐related tropical circulation adjustments and clarify the relative importance of different pathways, offering important implications for understanding ENSO‐induced global climate impacts.

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Publication Details

Journal
Geophysical Research Letters
Published
2026-02-02
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1029/2025gl118492
Primary Topic
Climate variability and models
Type
article
Field-Weighted Citation Impact
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article

Impact of Inter‐Basin Interactions on ENSO‐Associated Hadley Circulation Adjustments

Yurong Hou, Tao Lian, Weiqi Wang, Yadi Li et al.
Geophysical Research Letters
Climate variability and models
article

Impact of Inter‐Basin Interactions on ENSO‐Associated Hadley Circulation Adjustments

Yurong Hou, Tao Lian, Weiqi Wang, Yadi Li, Weichen Tao, Yujie Miao, Yueyue Yu, Xichen Li, Ya Wang
article en

Abstract

Abstract El Niño events are usually accompanied by Hadley circulation (HC) adjustment extending beyond the Pacific to the Atlantic and Indian Oceans. These remote HC adjustments arise through both pure atmospheric and ocean‐atmosphere coupling mechanisms, yet their relative importance remains unclear. In this study, we integrate observations with climate model experiments to assess the roles of pure atmospheric and coupled ocean‐atmosphere pathways linking ENSO to the global HC adjustments. Results show that El Niño intensifies deep convection over the Pacific but suppresses convection over the Atlantic and Indian Oceans via the tropospheric temperature mechanism. Meanwhile, El Niño‐induced Atlantic and Indian Oceans warming enhances convection and regional HC. These two pathways exert opposing influences, with pure atmospheric pathway as the dominant driver. These findings establish a novel inter‐basin dynamical perspective for ENSO‐related tropical circulation adjustments and clarify the relative importance of different pathways, offering important implications for understanding ENSO‐induced global climate impacts.

Geophysical Research LettersVol. 53(3)
China Meteorological Administration (CN), Shanghai Jiao Tong University (CN), Chinese Academy of Sciences (CN), Nanjing University of Information Science and Technology (CN), Peking University (CN), Ministry of Natural Resources (CN), Southern Marine Science and Engineering Guangdong Laboratory (Guangzhou) (CN), Second Institute of Oceanography (CN), Institute of Atmospheric Physics (CN), University of Chinese Academy of Sciences (CN), Southern Marine Science and Engineering Guangdong Laboratory (Zhuhai) (CN)
Life below water, Climate action
Openalex Percentile: Top 78%
Climate variability and models
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