The stratosphere as a puppeteer of European winter climate

摘要

The depletion of the stratospheric ozone layer and the increase of greenhouse gas concentrations have led to changes in the climate of the stratosphere, the atmospheric layer between about 10 and 50 km. Stratospheric climate change currently receives wide attention among environmental physicists, because it will likely influence the speed of recovery of the ozone layer, and it may induce climate change in the troposphere, the atmospheric layer between the earth's surface and the stratosphere. Recent studies indicate that a significant part of the European winter warming observed in the past and predicted for the next decades might be due to changes in the climate of the stratosphere. To some extent the troposphere and the stratosphere might be regarded here as puppet and puppeteer, respectively. Unusually, the puppet's weight is about ten times that of the puppeteer.