Researchers look into the future of the far North for clues to save species and maybe even bring back sea ice.

Original Source

Intermittent disruptions to rainfall patterns and intensity over the Pacific Ocean lasting up to B 1 year have major impacts on severe weather, agricultural production, ecosystems, and disease within the Pacific, and in many countries beyond. The frequency with which major disruptions to Pacific rainfall occur has been projected to increase over the 21st century, in response to global warming caused by large 21st century greenhouse gas emissions.

A major Australian government report published 25 years ago called for urgent investment in research on the impacts of climate change on human health. Since that report's release, less than 0.1% of Australian health funding has been allocated to this area. As the world continues on a high emissions pathway, the health impacts from climate change are increasing in size and complexity. While Australia has established leadership roles in climate science and health research, it must now link these two strengths.

The gradient of air temperature with elevation (the temperature lapse rate) in the tropics is predicted to become less steep during the coming century as surface temperature rises, enhancing the threat of warming in high-mountain environments. However, the sensitivity of the lapse rate to climate change is uncertain because of poor constraints on high-elevation temperature during past climate states.

Large accumulations of rainfall over a precipitation event can impact human infrastructure. Unlike precipitation intensity distributions, probability distributions for accumulations at first drop slowly with increasing size. At a certain size—the cutoff scale—the behavior regime changes, and the probabilities drop rapidly. In current climate, every region is protected from excessively large accumulations by this cutoff scale, and human activities are adapted to this.

Power stations, ships and air traffic are among the most potent greenhouse gas emitters and are primarily responsible for global warming. Iron salt aerosols (ISAs), composed partly of iron and chloride, exert a cooling effect on climate in several ways. This article aims firstly to examine all direct and indirect natural climate cooling mechanisms driven by ISA tropospheric aerosol particles, showing their cooperation and interaction within the different environmental compartments.

Reconstructing the history of tropical hydroclimates has been difficult, particularly for the Amazon basin—one of Earth’s major centres of deep atmospheric convection. For example, whether the Amazon basin was substantially drier or remained wet during glacial times has been controversial, largely because most study sites have been located on the periphery of the basin, and because interpretations can be complicated by sediment preservation, uncertainties in chronology, and topographical setting.