Regional disparities in warm season rainfall changes over arid eastern-central Asia Scientific Reports

Multiple studies have reported a shift in the trend of warm season rainfall over arid eastern–central Asia (AECA) around the turn of the new century, from increasing over the second half of the twentieth century to decreasing during the early years of the twenty-first. Here, a closer look based on multiple precipitation datasets reveals important regional disparities in these changes. Warm-season rainfall increased over both basin areas and mountain ranges during 1961–1998 due to enhanced moisture flux convergence associated with changes in the large-scale circulation and increases in atmospheric moisture content.