#26 Topic: Stratospheric Polar Vortex
Lecturer: Christoph Jacobi
Date: Monday, April 3, 2023 10:00 – 11:00 a.m.

The stratospheric polar vortex is a region of cold air, separated from  the middle latitudes by the zonal winter night jet, usually centered around the pole and reaching through the entire atmosphere from the troposphere to the upper mesosphere. It forms in winter through radiative cooling. It can be disturbed by the effect of planetary and gravity waves on the winter westerly circulation, occasionally leading to a breakdown of the vortex and sudden stratospheric warming. Vortex disturbances usually propagate downwards, often reaching the troposphere and thereby influencing the winter midlatitude circulation. In the lecture, an overview of the polar vortex dynamics, sudden stratospheric warmings, and stratospheric-tropospheric coupling is given.