© Thomas Reichler, University of Utah.The simplified artist’s conception shows how changes in polar vortex winds high in the stratosphere can influence the North Atlantic to cause changes in the global conveyor belt of ocean circulation.
From the University of Utah and the "science is not settled" department comes this interesting bit of research.Salt Lake City, Utah - Sept. 23, 2012 - A University of Utah study suggests something amazing: Periodic changes in winds 15 to 30 miles high in the stratosphere influence the seas by striking a vulnerable "Achilles heel" in the North Atlantic and changing mile-deep ocean circulation patterns, which in turn affect Earth's climate.
"We found evidence that what happens in the stratosphere matters for the ocean circulation and therefore for climate," says Thomas Reichler, senior author of the study published online Sunday, Sept. 23 in the journal
Nature Geoscience.
Scientists already knew that events in the stratosphere, 6 miles to 30 miles above Earth, affect what happens below in the troposphere, the part of the atmosphere from Earth's surface up to 6 miles or about 32,800 feet. Weather occurs in the troposphere.
Researchers also knew that global circulation patterns in the oceans - patterns caused mostly by variations in water temperature and saltiness - affect global climate.
"It is not new that the stratosphere impacts the troposphere," says Reichler, an associate professor of atmospheric sciences at the University of Utah. "It also is not new that the troposphere impacts the ocean. But now we actually demonstrated an entire link between the stratosphere, the troposphere and the ocean."
Funded by the University of Utah, Reichler conducted the study with University of Utah atmospheric sciences doctoral student Junsu Kim, and with atmospheric scientist Elisa Manzini and oceanographer Jürgen Kröger, both with the Max Planck Institute for Meteorology in Hamburg, Germany.
Comment: This seems to be more evidence of our changing atmosphere. For more information, please read:
Chemtrails, Disinformation and the Sixth Extinction
Reign of Fire: Meteorites, Wildfires, Planetary Chaos and the Sixth Extinction