Application of Downscaling Methods in the East Asian Climate Prediction

Variability of the East Asian climate is complicated, and the skill of the global dynamical prediction system is quite low over East Asia. Therefore, how to improve the climate prediction over East Asia is of highly scientifical and practical necessity. For this reason, a series of dynamical and statistical downscaling schemes have been developed for East Asian climate prediction research and real-time prediction in recent years, and these schemes are reviewed in this paper. We first introduce the real-time global dynamical prediction systems in China and their prediction capabilities, which are the scientific and technological basis for further development of downscaling methods. Further, recent studies on the evaluation and selection of physical parameterization schemes in regional climate models and their applications in the East Asian climate prediction are systematically reviewed. In the review of statistical downscaling methods, we mainly focus on researches on the East Asian summer and winter climate predictions. In addition, a new and skillful statistical-dynamical hybrid prediction method for East Asian winter climate prediction is developed. Finally, a number of scientific and technological questions that require further studies in the East Asian climate prediction are highlighted.