ACP Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics ACP 1680-7324 Copernicus GmbH Göttingen, Germany 10.5194/acp-10-9657-2010 The complex dynamics of the seasonal component of USA's surface temperature Vecchio A. 1 2 Capparelli V. 2 Carbone V. 2 3 Consorzio Nazionale Interuniversitario per le Scienze Fisiche della Materia (CNISM), unità di ricerca di Cosenza, Ponte P. Bucci cubo 31C, 87036 Rende (CS), Italy Dipartimento di Fisica, Università della Calabria, Italy Liquid Crystal Laboratory, IPCF/CNR, Italy 11 10 2010 10 19 9657 9665 This is an open-access article ditributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. This article is available from http://www.atmos-chem-phys.net/10/9657/2010/acp-10-9657-2010.html The full text article is available as a PDF file from http://www.atmos-chem-phys.net/10/9657/2010/acp-10-9657-2010.pdf

The dynamics of the climate system has been investigated by analyzing the complex seasonal oscillation of monthly averaged temperatures recorded at 1167 stations covering the whole USA. We found the presence of an orbit-climate relationship on time scales remarkably shorter than the Milankovitch period {related to the nutational forcing}. The relationship manifests itself through occasional destabilization of the phase of the seasonal component due to the local changing of balance between direct insolation and the net energy received by the Earth. Quite surprisingly, we found that the local intermittent dynamics is modulated by a periodic component of about 18.6 yr due to the nutation of the Earth, which represents the main modulation of the Earth's precession. The global effect in the last century results in a cumulative phase-shift of about 1.74 days towards earlier seasons, in agreement with the phase shift expected from the Earth's precession. The climate dynamics of the seasonal cycle can be described through a nonlinear circle-map, indicating that the destabilization process can be associated to intermittent transitions from quasi-periodicity to chaos.

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