Ocean Waves in Large-Scale Air-Sea Weather and Climate Systems

In spite of massive efforts directed to development of climate models over recent decades, accurate climate simulations and prediction remain a grand challenge. Large sea surface temperature model bias is one of the key indicators of the problem, among others. Qiao and his team suggested the concept of surface wave-induced turbulence and elaborated the way for such coupling, through turbulent processes at both sides of the air-ocean interface. These are the wave mixing in the ocean and wave modulation of air-sea fluxes. This wave-ocean coupled approach led to essential improvements of performance of ocean circulation and climate models, essentially introducing the next generation of large-scale air-sea interaction models. This Commentary reviews three recent JGR publications where the Qiao theory was implemented. The first paper (Huang & Qiao, 2021; https://doi.org/10.1029/2020JC016839) reported that the momentum gain by the ocean could be larger than the wind stress input, due to the ocean waves. The second paper (Chen et al., 2022; https://doi.org/10.1029/2021JC018360) demonstrated that, also due to waves, the drag coefficients in the atmospheric boundary layer have a spatial asymmetry during tropical cyclones. The third paper (Zhao et al., 2022; https://doi.org/10.1029/2022JC019015), based on combination of wave-coupled effects on both sides of air-sea interface, demonstrates their impact on simulation of tropical cyclone intensity. All papers are based on unique in situ measurements and their data analysis. The Commentary is further used as an opportunity to outline and review the current state of the small-large scale coupling topic with respect to ocean, weather and climate modeling.

Automated summary

Despite significant efforts, accurate climate simulations and predictions remain a challenge. The concept of surface wave-induced turbulence, proposed by Qiao and his team, has led to essential improvements in ocean circulation and climate models. Through in situ measurements and data analysis, three recent papers demonstrate the impact of wave effects on momentum gain, drag coefficients, and tropical cyclone intensity.