Emergence of universal scaling in weather extreme events

Abstract

The frequency and magnitude of weather extreme events have increased significantly during the past few years in response to anthropogenic climate change. However, global statistical characteristics and underlying physical mechanisms are still not fully understood. Here, we adopt a statistical physics and probability theory based method to investigate the nature of extreme weather events, particularly the statistics of the day-to-day air temperature differences. These statistical measurements reveal that the distributions of the magnitudes of the extreme events satisfy a universal \textit{Gumbel} distribution, while the waiting time of those extreme events is governed by a universal \textit{Gamma} function. Further finite-size effects analysis indicates robust scaling behaviours. We additionally unveil that the cumulative distribution of logarithmic waiting times between the record events follows an \textit{Exponential} distribution and that the evolution of this climate system is directional where the underlying dynamics are related to a decelerating release of tension. The universal scaling laws are remarkably stable and unaffected by global warming. Counterintuitively, unlike as expected for record dynamics, we find that the number of quakes of the extreme temperature variability does not decay as one over time but with deviations relevant to large-scale climate extreme events. Our theoretical framework provides a fresh perspective on the linkage of universality, scaling, and climate systems. The findings throw light on the nature of the weather variabilities and could guide us to better forecast extreme events.