EMBRACE-AGS-Growth: Compounding Extremes--Trends in, Links among, and Impacts of Marine Heatwaves, Human Heat Stress, and Heavy Precipitation in the Southeast United States

随着全球气温上升，极端高温和降雨事件在美国东南部等温暖潮湿气候中发生的频率和强度都有所增加。这些极端事件表现为可破坏生态系统的异常海洋高温事件（海洋热浪[MHWs]）、陆地湿热应力和强降水。虽然这些极端事件都被单独研究过，但本项目将是第一个调查它们在美国东南部的复合共同发生、趋势和联系的项目。此外，通过结合人口普查得出的人类脆弱性指标，本研究将确定美国东南部受这三种复合极端事件影响最大的次区域和大都市地区，这些地区往往对脆弱人口造成最大的损失。为了向相关利益攸关方和公众传达关键成果，将每月制作专业质量的广播视频，并通过社交媒体和网络平台传播。这些广播将由主办机构的STEM学生和专业人士领导，培养一批负责开展气候变化研究的年轻研究人员，并定期将其传达给不同的受众。尽管发生在不同的时间尺度上，mhw、湿热应力和强降水事件的强度和频率都有所增加，特别是在湿润的亚热带气候，如美国东南部。该项目将首先建立美国东南部附近海域mhw的气候学和趋势分析。这项工作将阐明与MHWs相邻的陆地地区极端湿热应力的频率和趋势。项目的第三阶段将研究过去几十年来三种极端事件类型的复合发生和因果机制。这种分析将增加对复合极端事件的频率和趋势的理解，以及将它们联系起来的物理机制。最后，将社会脆弱性数据整合到复合极端事件数据集中，生成美国东南部的网格化复合极端事件脆弱性指数。该指数将能够识别出那些不仅经历更频繁、更严重的复合极端事件，而且包含大量社会经济弱势群体、排水不良、缺乏冷却设施的地区，所有这些都可能导致复合灾害对人类的更大影响。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

As global temperatures have risen, extreme heat and rainfall events have increased in frequency and intensity in warm humid climates such as the Southeast U.S. These extremes are manifested in anomalous ocean heat events that can devastate ecosystems (marine heat waves [MHWs]), humid heat stress over land, and heavy precipitation. While each of these extremes has been studied individually, this project will be the first to investigate their compound co-occurrences, trends, and links in the Southeast U.S. Furthermore, by incorporating census-derived metrics of human vulnerability, this research will identify the sub-regions and metropolitan areas within the Southeast U.S. that are most affected by the three compound extremes, which often exact their greatest toll on vulnerable populations. To communicate key results to relevant stakeholders and the public, monthly professional-quality broadcast videos will be produced and disseminated through social media and web platforms. The broadcasts will be led by STEM students and professionals at the host institution, creating a cohort of young researchers responsible for undertaking climate change research and communicating it to diverse audiences on a regular basis. Despite occurring on different timescales, MHWs, humid heat stress, and heavy precipitation events have all increased in intensity and frequency, especially in humid subtropical climates such as the Southeast U.S. This project will first establish a climatology and trend analysis of MHWs in waters adjacent to the Southeast U.S. Next, using wet bulb globe temperature and high-resolution reanalysis data, work will elucidate the frequencies and trends in humid heat stress extremes over land areas adjacent to MHWs. The third project phase will examine the compound occurrences and causal mechanisms among the three extreme event types over the past few decades. This analysis will increase understanding of the frequency and trends in the compound extremes, as well as the physical mechanisms that connect them. Finally, social vulnerability data will be integrated into the compound extremes dataset to produce a gridded compound extremes vulnerability index for the Southeast U.S. This index will be able to identify areas that are not only experiencing more frequent and severe compound extremes, but also contain large numbers of socioeconomically vulnerable persons, poor drainage, and lack access to cooling, all of which can result in even greater human impacts from compound hazards.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.