An upper bound for extreme temperatures over midlatitude land

Significance Heatwaves cause great harm to societies, especially in midlatitude regions that are not adapted to high temperatures. An accurate projection for extremely high temperatures is thus needed to guide adaptation to ongoing global warming. Here, we provide a theory for the upper bound of midlatitude surface temperatures and a scaling for how annual maximum temperatures over midlatitude land will change with global warming.

• Publication year

  2023

• Venue

  Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America

• Publication date

  2023-03-14

• Fields of study

  Medicine, Environmental Science

• Identifiers
  DOI 10.1073/pnas.2215278120PMID 36917663PMCID 10041138
• External record

  Open on Semantic Scholar

• Source metadata

  Semantic Scholar, PubMed

• No claims are published for this paper.

• No concepts are published for this paper.

• The 2021 Pacific Northwest Heat Wave and Associated Blocking: Meteorology and the Role of an Upstream Cyclone as a Diabatic Source of Wave Activity

  2022cited by this paper
• How Unexpected Was the 2021 Pacific Northwest Heatwave?

  2022cited by this paper
• Quantifying energy balance regimes in the modern climate, their link to lapse rate regimes, and their response to warming

  2021cited by this paper
• Projections of tropical heat stress constrained by atmospheric dynamics

  2021cited by this paper
• Rapid attribution analysis of the extraordinary heatwave on the Pacific Coast of the US and Canada June 2021

  2021cited by this paper
• Disentangling dynamical and thermodynamical contributions to the record-breaking heatwave over Central Europe in June 2019

  2021cited by this paper
• Hot extremes have become drier in the United States Southwest

  2021cited by this paper
• I Overview

  2020cited by this paper
• An Updated Assessment of Near‐Surface Temperature Change From 1850: The HadCRUT5 Data Set

  2020cited by this paper
• The ERA5 global reanalysis

  2020influential reference
• Amplified warming of extreme temperatures over tropical land

  2020cited by this paper
• A comprehensive evaluation of soil moisture and soil temperature from third‐generation atmospheric and land reanalysis data sets

  2020cited by this paper
• Development of an Updated Global Land In Situ‐Based Data Set of Temperature and Precipitation Extremes: HadEX3

  2020influential reference
• Collaborative impact of the NAO and atmospheric blocking on European heatwaves, with a focus on the hot summer of 2018

  2020cited by this paper
• Moist Heat Stress on a Hotter Earth

  2020cited by this paper
• Nonlinear increases in extreme temperatures paradoxically dampen increases in extreme humid-heat

  2019cited by this paper
• The day the 2003 European heatwave record was broken.

  2019cited by this paper
• Amplification of mega-heatwaves through heat torrents fuelled by upwind drought

  2019cited by this paper
• Identifying Key Driving Processes of Major Recent Heat Waves

  2019cited by this paper
• The LoCo Perspective

  2018cited by this paper
• Trends in continental temperature and humidity directly linked to ocean warming

  2018cited by this paper
• : A Review of the

  2018cited by this paper
• Land–Atmosphere Interactions: The LoCo Perspective

  2017cited by this paper
• A Simple Moisture Advection Model of Specific Humidity Change over Land in Response to SST Warming

  2016cited by this paper
• Sensitivity of Satellite-Derived Tropospheric Temperature Trends to the Diurnal Cycle Adjustment

  2016cited by this paper
• North American extreme temperature events and related large scale meteorological patterns: a review of statistical methods, dynamics, modeling, and trends

  2016cited by this paper
• A Review of Recent Advances in Research on Extreme Heat Events

  2016cited by this paper
• Atmospheric changes through 2012 as shown by iteratively homogenized radiosonde temperature and wind data (IUKv2)

  2015cited by this paper
• Contribution of changes in atmospheric circulation patterns to extreme temperature trends

  2015cited by this paper
• A Lagrangian investigation of hot and cold temperature extremes in Europe

  2015cited by this paper
• Mortality Related to Air Pollution with the Moscow Heat Wave and Wildfire of 2010

  2014cited by this paper
• Mega-heatwave temperatures due to combined soil desiccation and atmospheric heat accumulation

  2014cited by this paper
• Land–Ocean Warming Contrast over a Wide Range of Climates: Convective Quasi-Equilibrium Theory and Idealized Simulations

  2013cited by this paper
• Evaluating CMIP5 models using AIRS tropospheric air temperature and specific humidity climatology

  2013influential reference
• Entrainment and detrainment in cumulus convection: an overview

  2013cited by this paper
• Quantifying the relevance of atmospheric blocking for co‐located temperature extremes in the Northern Hemisphere on (sub‐)daily time scales

  2012cited by this paper
• The impact of the El Niño‐Southern Oscillation on maximum temperature extremes

  2012cited by this paper
• The Central European and Russian Heat Event of July–August 2010

  2011cited by this paper
• An adaptability limit to climate change due to heat stress

  2010cited by this paper
• Investigating soil moisture-climate interactions in a changing climate: A review

  2010cited by this paper
• Mechanisms for the land/sea warming contrast exhibited by simulations of climate change

  2008cited by this paper
• Influence of Modes of Climate Variability on Global Temperature Extremes

  2008cited by this paper
• Contribution of land‐atmosphere coupling to recent European summer heat waves

  2007cited by this paper
• A Climatology of the Tropospheric Thermal Stratification Using Saturation Potential Vorticity

  2007cited by this paper
• Large-scale changes in observed daily maximum and minimum temperatures: Creation and analysis of a new gridded data set

  2006cited by this paper
• Land–atmosphere coupling and climate change in Europe

  2006cited by this paper
• Soil moisture and predicted spells of extreme temperatures in Britain

  2005cited by this paper
• Sensitivity of moist convection to environmental humidity

  2004cited by this paper
• Understanding Hydrometeorology Using Global Models

  2004cited by this paper
• Atmospheric Controls on Soil Moisture-Boundary Layer Interactions

  2001cited by this paper
• Dependence of Extreme Daily Maximum Temperatures on Antecedent Soil Moisture in the Contiguous United States during Summer

  2000cited by this paper
• A Soil Moisture–Rainfall Feedback Mechanism: 1. Theory and observations

  1998cited by this paper
• Analysis of model-calculated soil moisture over the United States (1931-1993) and applications to long-range temperature forecasts

  1996cited by this paper
• On large-scale circulations in convecting atmospheres

  1994cited by this paper
• Is the Tropical Atmosphere Conditionally Unstable

  1989cited by this paper

• Orthogonal parametrisations of Extreme-Value distributions

  2026cites this paper
• Phase‐Asymmetric Thermal Sensitivity Amplifies Respiration Hysteresis in Heatwaves

  2026cites this paper
• Projected changes in atmospheric pathways of Western North American heatwaves simulated from high-resolution coupled model simulations

  2026cites this paper
• The Role of Land‐Atmosphere Feedbacks in Midlatitude Wintertime Surface Temperature Variability

  2026cites this paper
• The other climate crisis

  2025cites this paper
• Parameterization adaption needed to unlock the benefits of increased resolution for the ITCZ in ICON

  2025cites this paper
• Impact of Asian Summer Monsoon on the 2021 Pacific Northwest Heatwave: Can It? Did It?

  2025cites this paper
• Huge ensembles – Part 2: Properties of a huge ensemble of hindcasts generated with spherical Fourier neural operators

  2025cites this paper
• Moist Energy Constraints on Surface Temperature Variance Under Climate Warming

  2025cites this paper
• Upper bounds for 21st-century surface air temperatures in the Western United States

  2025influential citation
• Accelerated shifts from heatwaves to heavy rainfall in a changing climate

  2025cites this paper
• Is Water Stress the Root Cause of the Observed Nonlinear Relationship Between Yield Losses and Temperature?

  2025cites this paper
• Dynamical Systems Methods to Understand Projected Heatwave Intensification

  2025cites this paper
• On the mean precipitation characteristics of North American heatwaves

  2025cites this paper
• Projections of Lightning‐Ignited Wildfire Risk in the Western United States

  2025cites this paper
• The relative contribution of physical processes leading the May 2024 heat wave in Cuba using a novel temperature anomaly analysis

  2025cites this paper
• Moist Adiabatic Scaling Explains Mean and Fast Upper‐Level Jet Stream Wind Response to Climate Change

  2025influential citation
• The spatial extent of heat waves has changed over the past four decades

  2025cites this paper
• The climatology of extremely high warm‐season temperatures and their sensitivity to climate change

  2025cites this paper
• Tropical Moist Heat Extremes on Small Scales Are Not Well Constrained by Reanalysis‐Derived Quasi‐Equilibrium Relationships

  2025cites this paper
• Distinct Favored Regions for Historical Record‐Setting and Future Record‐Breaking Humid Heat

  2025cites this paper
• Long vs. short: understanding the dynamics of persistent summer hot spells in Europe

  2025cites this paper
• Atmospheric stability sets maximum moist heat and convection in the midlatitudes

  2025influential citation
• Data-driven upper bounds and event attribution for unprecedented heatwaves

  2025cites this paper
• Analytical Model for the Higher Order Moments of Midlatitude Atmospheric Temperature Distributions

  2025cites this paper
• Mortality impacts of the most extreme heat events

  2025influential citation
• Diagnosing Nonlocal Vertical Acceleration in Moist Convection Using a Large‐Eddy Simulation

  2025cites this paper
• Sensitivity of European blocking to physical parameters in a large ensemble climate model experiment

  2025cites this paper
• Recommendations for Comprehensive and Independent Evaluation of Machine Learning‐Based Earth System Models

  2025cites this paper
• Huge Ensembles Part II: Properties of a Huge Ensemble of Hindcasts Generated with Spherical Fourier Neural Operators

  2024cites this paper
• Role of atmospheric resonance and land–atmosphere feedbacks as a precursor to the June 2021 Pacific Northwest Heat Dome event

  2024cites this paper
• Using spatial extreme-value theory with machine learning to model and understand spatially compounding weather extremes

  2024cites this paper
• Amplification effect of intra-seasonal variability of soil moisture on heat extremes over Eurasia

  2024cites this paper
• Investigating monthly geopotential height changes and mid-latitude Northern Hemisphere westerlies

  2024cites this paper
• Understanding the vertical temperature structure of recent record-shattering heatwaves

  2024influential citation
• A New, Zero‐Iteration Analytic Implementation of Wet‐Bulb Globe Temperature: Development, Validation, and Comparison With Other Methods

  2024cites this paper
• Acceleration of daily land temperature extremes and correlations with surface energy fluxes

  2024cites this paper
• Amplified summer wind stilling and land warming compound energy risks in Northern Midlatitudes

  2024cites this paper
• Western Europe’s extreme July 2019 heatwave in a warmer world

  2024cites this paper
• Evaluating downscaled products with expected hydroclimatic co-variances

  2024cites this paper
• Moist heatwaves intensified by entrainment of dry air that limits deep convection

  2024cites this paper
• How could 50 °C be reached in Paris: Analyzing the CMIP6 ensemble to design storylines for adaptation

  2024cites this paper
• Theory and the future of land-climate science

  2024cites this paper
• Predicting Cloud‐To‐Ground Lightning in the Western United States From the Large‐Scale Environment Using Explainable Neural Networks

  2024cites this paper
• Predicting Heatwaves’ Highest Temperatures

  2023cites this paper
• Increased Population Exposure to Heat and Wet Extremes Moving From Chinese to Global 1.5 or 2.0°C Warming

  2023cites this paper
• Storylines for unprecedented heatwaves based on ensemble boosting

  2023cites this paper
• A Novel Temperature Anomaly Source Diagnostic: Method and Application to the 2021 Heatwave in the Pacific Northwest

  2023influential citation
• Extreme heat wave sampling and prediction with analog Markov chain and comparisons with deep learning

  2023cites this paper
• Robust Relationship Between Midlatitudes CAPE and Moist Static Energy Surplus in Present and Future Simulations

  2023cites this paper
• Characteristics of population exposure to climate extremes from regional to global 1.5 °C and 2.0 °C warming in CMIP6 models

  2023cites this paper
• Fast upper-level jet stream winds get faster under climate change

  2023cites this paper
• Global Climate

  2021cites this paper
• Proposer of the vote of thanks and contribution to the JRSS-C Discussion of ”Inference for extreme spatial temperature events in a changing climate with application to Ireland”

  year unknowncites this paper
• The European summer heatwave 2019 - a regional storyline perspective

  year unknowncites this paper
• Dry and moist convective upper bounds for near-surface temperatures

  year unknowncites this paper
• A Bayesian statistical method to estimate the climatology of extreme temperature under multiple scenarios: the ANKIALE package

  year unknowncites this paper