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Article: Lapse rate trends and climate variability
- Article from:
- Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society
- Article date:
- September 1, 2002
- Author:
CopyrightCopyright American Meteorological Society Sep 2002. Provided by ProQuest LLC. (Hide copyright information)
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During the past 20 years satellite measurements of global tropospheric temperature have risen more slowly than surface air temperature. As a result, the surface to lower tropospheric lapse rate has increased 0.12 K decade-1 from 1979 to August 2001. However, during the preceding 15 years, lower-tropospheric temperature (recorded by radiosonde measurements) warmed faster than the surface-a decrease in the lapse rate. Although both lapse rate trends are subtle, they raise questions about our understanding of climate change throughout the atmosphere. Our recent research demonstrates that neither the recent increase nor the previous decrease of lapse rate can be explained in terms of the major ...