Convective moisture adjustment time scale as a key factor in regulating model amplitude of the Madden-Julian Oscillation

Despite its pronounced impacts on weather extremes worldwide, the Madden-Julian Oscillation (MJO) remains poorly represented in climate models. Here we present findings that point to some necessary ingredients to produce a strong MJO amplitude in a large set of model simulations from a recent model intercomparison project. While surface flux and radiative heating anomalies are considered important for amplifying the MJO, their strength per unit MJO precipitation anomaly is found to be negatively correlated to MJO amplitude across these multimodel simulations. However, model MJO amplitude is found to be closely tied to a model's convective moisture adjustment time scale, a measure of how rapidly precipitation must increase to remove excess column water vapor, or alternately the efficiency of surface precipitation generation per unit column water vapor anomaly. These findings provide critical insights into key model processes for the MJO and pinpoint a direction for improved model representation of the MJO.