热带气旋是形成在热带或副热带洋面上,具有有组织的对流和确定的气旋性地面风环流的非锋面性的天气尺度系统.世界气象组织将最大风速在32.7ms^-1以上的热带气旋称为台风或飓风.由台风引起的强风、暴雨、巨浪等气象灾害给人类带来巨大的损失,其影响范围广,发生频率高,使得对台风的研究成为全球关注的气象课题.本文侧重总结了近8年来(1998~2005)Science和Nature杂志中有关台风研究的文章,综合了国际权威科学家对台风关注的最新进展和研究成果.其中在台风观测手段改进方面,如Doppler雷达对于边界层强滚动现象的发现,GPS风廓线仪对于台风中海-气边界层理论拖曳系数的修正;而在动力结构的研究方面,海气相互作用的重要性,特别是对台风强度预报的影响有了新的认识;在全球变暖的大背景下,气候变化对台风活动趋势的影响成为科学家日益关心和争论的话题.
Tropical cyclone (TC) is a non-frontal synoptic scale system with well-organized convection and certain cyclonic surface wind circumfluence, which forms on the surface of tropic or sub-tropic Ocean. WMO(World Meteorology Organization) named a standard one of tropic cyclone with maximal wind speed greater than 32.7 ms^-1 as typhoon or hurricane. Typhoon brings expensive mischance to human as strong wind, torrential rain, billow, etc, its wide incidence and high frequency made typhoon research a worldwide meteorological task. This article introduces the newest progress and research results by summarizing studies about typhoon in Science and Nature in recent eight years(from 1998 to 2005). Observation improvement of typhoon, results discovery the phenomena of boundary layer rolls by Doppler radar, and also results the modification of drag coeffcient of air- sea boundary-layer theory associated with tropical cyclones by GPS(Global Positioning System) Sonde. After researching typhoon's dynamical structure, there are new views over importance of air-sea interaction, especially TC intensity forecasting; in the background of global warming, the impact on trend of typhoon activity by climate change has become a hot topic and an important concern to scientists.