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P. Hitchcock

Visualizing Polar Stratospheric Variability

The principal component time series of polar-cap averaged temperature profiles can be used to produce very compact visualizations of the evolution of the Arctic vortex over the whole length of reanalysis datasets. These visualizations, called 'abacus' plots, are very useful to compare the timing and characteristics of sudden warmings, and other similar events. I will show abacus plots for several reanalysis products and demonstrate their utility in showing how these products capture polar stratospheric variability.

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