Over the last three decades, the South Pole has experienced a record-high statistically significant warming of 0.61 ± 0.34 °C per decade, more than three times the global average. Here, we use an ensemble of climate model experiments to show this recent warming lies within the upper bounds of the simulated range of natural variability. The warming resulted from a strong cyclonic anomaly in the Weddell Sea caused by increasing sea surface temperatures in the western tropical Pacific. This circulation, coupled with a positive polarity of the Southern Annular Mode, advected warm and moist air from the South Atlantic into the Antarctic interior. These results underscore the intimate linkage of interior Antarctic climate to tropical variability. Further, this study shows that atmospheric internal variability can induce extreme regional climate change over the Antarctic interior, which has masked any anthropogenic warming signal there during the twenty-first century.

在过去的三十年中，南极经历了创纪录的每十年0.61±0.34°C的变暖，是全球平均水平的三倍多。在这里，我们使用一组气候模型实验来表明这种最近的变暖现象处于模拟的自然变异范围的上限之内。变暖是由于韦德海强烈的气旋异常所致，该异常是由于西部热带太平洋海面温度升高而引起的。这种环流加上南环空模式的正极性，将温暖和潮湿的空气从南大西洋吹入了南极内部。这些结果强调了南极内部气候与热带多变的密切联系。进一步，