A topological perspective on weather regimes
It has long been suggested that the mid-latitude atmospheric circulation possesses what has come to be known as ‘weather regimes’, loosely categorised as regions of phase space with above-average density and/or extended persistence. Their existence and behaviour has been extensively studied in meteo...
| Main Authors: | , , , |
|---|---|
| Format: | Journal article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Springer
2022
|
| _version_ | 1826310274766864384 |
|---|---|
| author | Strommen, K Chantry, M Dorrington, J Otter, N |
| author_facet | Strommen, K Chantry, M Dorrington, J Otter, N |
| author_sort | Strommen, K |
| collection | OXFORD |
| description | It has long been suggested that the mid-latitude atmospheric circulation possesses what has come to be known as ‘weather regimes’, loosely categorised as regions of phase space with above-average density and/or extended persistence. Their existence and behaviour has been extensively studied in meteorology and climate science, due to their potential for drastically simplifying the complex and chaotic mid-latitude dynamics. Several well-known, simple non-linear dynamical systems have been used as toy-models of the atmosphere in order to understand and exemplify such regime behaviour. Nevertheless, no agreed-upon and clear-cut definition of a ‘regime’ exists in the literature, and unambiguously detecting their existence in the atmospheric circulation is stymied by the high dimensionality of the system. We argue here for an approach which equates the existence of regimes in a dynamical system with the existence of non-trivial topological structure of the system’s attractor. We show using persistent homology, an algorithmic tool in topological data analysis, that this approach is computationally tractable, practically informative, and identifies the relevant regime structure across a range of examples. |
| first_indexed | 2024-03-07T07:49:33Z |
| format | Journal article |
| id | oxford-uuid:215030d8-9d92-4fab-b268-cffe641475aa |
| institution | University of Oxford |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-03-07T07:49:33Z |
| publishDate | 2022 |
| publisher | Springer |
| record_format | dspace |
| spelling | oxford-uuid:215030d8-9d92-4fab-b268-cffe641475aa2023-07-11T10:50:08ZA topological perspective on weather regimesJournal articlehttp://purl.org/coar/resource_type/c_dcae04bcuuid:215030d8-9d92-4fab-b268-cffe641475aaEnglishSymplectic ElementsSpringer2022Strommen, KChantry, MDorrington, JOtter, NIt has long been suggested that the mid-latitude atmospheric circulation possesses what has come to be known as ‘weather regimes’, loosely categorised as regions of phase space with above-average density and/or extended persistence. Their existence and behaviour has been extensively studied in meteorology and climate science, due to their potential for drastically simplifying the complex and chaotic mid-latitude dynamics. Several well-known, simple non-linear dynamical systems have been used as toy-models of the atmosphere in order to understand and exemplify such regime behaviour. Nevertheless, no agreed-upon and clear-cut definition of a ‘regime’ exists in the literature, and unambiguously detecting their existence in the atmospheric circulation is stymied by the high dimensionality of the system. We argue here for an approach which equates the existence of regimes in a dynamical system with the existence of non-trivial topological structure of the system’s attractor. We show using persistent homology, an algorithmic tool in topological data analysis, that this approach is computationally tractable, practically informative, and identifies the relevant regime structure across a range of examples. |
| spellingShingle | Strommen, K Chantry, M Dorrington, J Otter, N A topological perspective on weather regimes |
| title | A topological perspective on weather regimes |
| title_full | A topological perspective on weather regimes |
| title_fullStr | A topological perspective on weather regimes |
| title_full_unstemmed | A topological perspective on weather regimes |
| title_short | A topological perspective on weather regimes |
| title_sort | topological perspective on weather regimes |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT strommenk atopologicalperspectiveonweatherregimes AT chantrym atopologicalperspectiveonweatherregimes AT dorringtonj atopologicalperspectiveonweatherregimes AT ottern atopologicalperspectiveonweatherregimes AT strommenk topologicalperspectiveonweatherregimes AT chantrym topologicalperspectiveonweatherregimes AT dorringtonj topologicalperspectiveonweatherregimes AT ottern topologicalperspectiveonweatherregimes |