Walker circulation variability and associated zonal shifts in the heating of the tropical atmosphere have far-reaching global impacts well into high latitudes. Yet the reversed high latitude–to–Walker circulation teleconnection is not fully understood. Here, we reveal the dynamical pathways of this teleconnection across different components of the climate system using a hierarchy of climate model simulations. In the fully coupled system with ocean circulation adjustments, the Walker circulation strengthens in response to extratropical radiative cooling of either hemisphere, associated with the upwelling of colder subsurface water in the eastern equatorial Pacific. By contrast, in the absence of ocean circulation adjustments, the Walker circulation response is sensitive to the forcing hemisphere, due to the blocking effect of the northward-displaced climatological intertropical convergence zone and shortwave cloud radiative effects. Our study implies that energy biases in the extratropics can cause pronounced changes of tropical climate patterns.

沃克环流的变异性和热带大气加热中相关的纬向转移，已对高纬度地区产生了深远的全球影响。然而，人们对高纬度到沃克环流遥相关的反向联系还没有完全了解。在这里，我们使用气候模型模拟的层次结构揭示了这种遥相关在气候系统不同组成部分之间的动力学路径。在具有海洋环流调节的完全耦合系统中，沃克环流响应于任一半球的温带辐射冷却而增强，这与赤道东太平洋较冷的地下水的上升有关。相比之下，在没有海洋环流调节的情况下，沃克环流响应对强迫半球很敏感，由于北移的气候热带辐合带的阻塞效应和短波云辐射效应。我们的研究表明，温带地区的能源偏差可能导致热带气候模式发生明显变化。