Large-Scale Dynamics and Global Warming

Predictions of future climate change raise a variety of issues in large-scale atmospheric and oceanic dynamics. Several of these are reviewed in this essay, including the sensitivity of the circulation of the Atlantic Ocean to increasing freshwater input at high latitudes; the possibility of greenhouse cooling in the southern oceans; the sensitivity of monsoonal circulations to differential warming of the two hemispheres; the response of midlatitude storms to changing temperature gradients and increasing water vapor in the atmosphere; and the possible importance of positive feedback between the mean winds and eddy-induced heating in the polar stratosphere.