* Astronomy

Blobrana · L

RE: Ancient climate

Blobrana · L

Bølling interstadial period

Blobrana · L

RE: Ancient climate

Blobrana · L

Ancient Arabic writings can help redo past climate

Ancient manuscripts written by Arabic scholars during the 9th and 10th centuries can provide valuable meteorological information to help modern scientists reconstruct the climate of the past, according to a new study.
The research analyses the writings of scholars, historians and diarists in Iraq during the Islamic Golden Age between 816-1009 AD for evidence of abnormal weather patterns.
Read more

Blobrana · L

Title: Assessing the Medieval Climate Anomaly in the Middle East: The potential of Arabic documentary sources
Authors: Steffen Vogt, R. Glaser, J. Luterbacher, D. Riemann, Gh. Al Dyab, J. Schoenbein and E. Garcia-Bustamante

New evidence from documentary sources provides detailed climatic information to fill the Middle East gap in Medieval Climate Anomaly reconstructions.

The Middle East region harbours a wealth of documentary and natural archives that contain detailed information on climate conditions and events. To date, however, only a few proxy-based climate reconstructions are available from the area for the assessment of thermal and hydroclimatic characteristics of the Medieval Climate Anomaly (MCA). Existing chronologies and reconstructions mostly provide information for specific seasons and hydroclimatic parameters (commonly precipitation and droughts). The reconstructions are based on natural proxies such as tree rings (e.g., Touchan et al., 2007), pollen records (Kaniewski et al., 2010), speleothems (e.g., Bar Matthews et al., 1997; Frumkin et al., 1991; Fleitmann et al., 2004), lake sedimentary records (e.g., Kuzucuoglu et al., 2011), Dead Sea sedimentary records (e.g., Enzel et al., 2003; Migowski et al., 2006) or Red Sea corals (e.g., Felis and Nimbur, 2010). For compilations of available data from natural and documentary archives the reader is referred to Luterbacher et al. (2006, 2011) and references therein. Most of this data is hampered by a high degree of spatial and temporal variability and/or insufficient spatio-temporal resolution to assess in detail the MCA climate. Therefore its spatial and temporal extent in the Middle East requires further investigations.

Read more (PDF)

Blobrana · L

Paleoclimate Record Points Toward Potential Rapid Climate Changes

New research into the Earth's paleoclimate history by NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies director James E. Hansen suggests the potential for rapid climate changes this century, including multiple meters of sea level rise, if global warming is not abated.
By looking at how the Earth's climate responded to past natural changes, Hansen sought insight into a fundamental question raised by ongoing human-caused climate change: "What is the dangerous level of global warming?" Some international leaders have suggested a goal of limiting warming to 2 degrees Celsius from pre-industrial times in order to avert catastrophic change. But Hansen said at a press briefing at a meeting of the American Geophysical Union in San Francisco on Tues, Dec. 6, that warming of 2 degrees Celsius would lead to drastic changes, such as significant ice sheet loss in Greenland and Antarctica.
Based on Hansen's temperature analysis work at the Goddard Institute for Space Studies, the Earth's average global surface temperature has already risen .8 degrees Celsius since 1880, and is now warming at a rate of more than .1 degree Celsius every decade. This warming is largely driven by increased greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, particularly carbon dioxide, emitted by the burning of fossil fuels at power plants, in cars and in industry. At the current rate of fossil fuel burning, the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere will have doubled from pre-industrial times by the middle of this century. A doubling of carbon dioxide would cause an eventual warming of several degrees, Hansen said.
Read more

Blobrana · L

Bond event

Blobrana · L

RE: Ancient climate

Blobrana · L

Title: Climate related sea-level variations over the past two millennia
Authors: Kemp, A.C., Horton, B.P., Donnelly, J.P., Mann, M.E., Vermeer, M., Rahmstorf, S.

Read more (PDF)

Blobrana · L

Early Antarctic Circumpolar Current Development Impacted Global Climate

Thirty-eight million years ago, tropical jungles thrived in what are now the cornfields of the American Midwest and furry marsupials wandered temperate forests in what is now the frozen Antarctic. The temperature differences of that era, known as the late Eocene, between the equator and Antarctica were only half of what they are today. A debate has long been raging in the scientific community on what changes in our global climate system led to such a major shift from the more tropical, greenhouse climate of the Eocene to the modern and much cooler climates of today.
Read more