<div>The "deep solar minimum," "...<font face="Verdana" size="2">the quietest sun we've seen in almost a century," according to sunspot expert David Hathaway of the Marshall Space Flight Center, might also be slowing the temperature forcing of increasing levels of anthropogenic sourced atmospheric greenhouse gases, yet global temperatures remained well above the 20th century average, in 2009:</font></div>
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<div><font face="Verdana" size="2"><a href="http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2009/01apr_deepsolarminimum.htm">http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2009/01apr_deepsolarminimum.htm</a></font></div>
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<div><a href="http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/?report=global">http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/?report=global</a></div>
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<div><a href="http://www.noaanews.noaa.gov/stories2010/20100128_watervapor.html">http://www.noaanews.noaa.gov/stories2010/20100128_watervapor.html</a></div>
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<div><a href="http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/science.1182488">http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/science.1182488</a></div>
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<p id="article-info">Published Online <span>January</span> <span>28</span>, 2010<br><em><span>Science</span></em> DOI: 10.1126/<span>science</span>.1182488</p></td>
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<div id="page-nav"><a class="LinkPrev" title="Go to previous article" href="http://www.sciencemag.org/sciencexpress/recent.dtl"><em><span>Science</span></em> Express Index</a></div></td></tr></tbody></table>
<h2>Research Articles</h2>
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<h2>Contributions of Stratospheric <span>Water</span> <span>Vapor</span> to Decadal Changes in the Rate of Global Warming</h2><strong>Susan <span>Solomon</span>,<sup>1</sup> Karen Rosenlof,<sup>1</sup> Robert Portmann,<sup>1</sup> John Daniel,<sup>1</sup> Sean Davis,<sup>1</sup><sup>,2</sup> Todd Sanford,<sup>1</sup><sup>,2</sup> Gian-Kasper Plattner<sup>3</sup> </strong>
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<div class="Abstract">Stratospheric <span>water</span> <span>vapor</span> concentrations decreased by about<sup> </sup>10% after the year 2000. Here, we show that this acted to slow<sup> </sup>the rate of increase in global surface temperature over 2000<sup> </sup>to 2009 by about 25% compared to that which would have occurred<sup> </sup>due only to carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. More<sup> </sup>limited data suggest that stratospheric <span>water</span> <span>vapor</span> probably<sup> </sup>increased between 1980 and 2000, which would have enhanced the<sup> </sup>decadal rate of surface warming during the 1990s by about 30%<sup> </sup>compared to estimates neglecting this change. These findings<sup> </sup>show that stratospheric <span>water</span> <span>vapor</span> represents an important<sup> </sup>driver of decadal global surface climate change.<sup> </sup>
<p></p></div><font size="-1"><sup>1</sup> NOAA Earth System Research Laboratory, Chemical <span>Science</span>s Division, Boulder, CO, USA. <br><sup>2</sup> Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental <span>Science</span>s, University of Colorado, Boulder, Colorado, USA.<br>
<sup>3</sup> Climate and Environmental Physics, Physics Institute, University of Bern, Sidlerstrasse 5, 3012 Bern, Switzerland. </font>
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Received for publication 25 September 2009. Accepted for publication 12 <span>January</span> 2010.</p></p></div>
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<div>Vision2020 Post: Ted Moffett</div></div>