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Atmospheric science

Desert dust and monsoon rain

The climate regimes of monsoon regions and deserts are connected. Satellite data and numerical experiments reveal that an increase in dust aerosol loading over the Arabian Sea and West Asia can lead to enhanced summer monsoon rainfall over central India on timescales of days to weeks.

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Figure 1: Desert dust over the Arabian Sea.

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Correspondence to William Lau.

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Lau, W. Desert dust and monsoon rain. Nature Geosci 7, 255–256 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1038/ngeo2115

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