Tropical marine low clouds play a crucial role in regulating Earth’s climate. However, whether they mitigate or exacerbate global warming has long remained a mystery.
Tropical marine low clouds play a crucial role in regulating Earth’s climate. However, whether they mitigate or exacerbate global warming has long remained a mystery. Now, researchers from the School of Engineering at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST) have developed a groundbreaking method that significantly improves accuracy in climate predictions. This led to a major discovery – that tropical cloud feedback may have amplified the greenhouse effect by a staggering 71% more than previously known to scientists.
The effects of tropical low clouds are difficult to investigate because they are influenced by a variety of factors. Commonly used low cloud controlling factors often struggle to separate the influence of local sea surface temperatures (SSTs) from that of temperatures in the free troposphere – the lowest layer of Earth’s atmosphere, casting uncertainty in projections.
Adding to the complexity are the substantial differences in cloud dynamics between two main stratocumulus regions on Earth, namely the tropical Pacific and Atlantic, based on observations.
A research team led by Prof. SU Hui, Chair Professor at the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering and Global STEM Professor at HKUST, has developed a new method to untangle the matrix.
Read more at Hong Kong University of Science and Technology
Image: Prof. SU Hui (left) and Prof. WU Mengxi (right), both from the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering of HKUST, have created a new method that significantly improves accuracy in climate predictions. (Credit: HKUST)
