Collaborative Research: Documenting Holocene Paleohydrology Using Multiproxy Lake Core Studies in the Yukon Territory, Canada

这一合作奖考察了区域降水-蒸发平衡及其对气候敏感的育空地区生态系统的影响。北极生态系统是全球气候变化的风向标，研究它们对自然气候变化的响应对于了解基本的地球系统过程以及此类系统对人类引起的气候变化的潜在响应至关重要。通过结合使用生物(即花粉、木炭)和非生物(即元素和同位素分析、磁化率、沉积分析)的替代指标，研究人员将产生过去1500年的高分辨率气候记录，以检查区域水分的变化。然后，这些结果将与阿拉斯加内陆正在进行的研究结果进行比较。这项研究将回答的一些问题是：“育空地区上游过去发生过降水-蒸发平衡的变化吗？这些变化是否发生在与人类相关的时间尺度上？这些变化是否在育空地区同步发生且方向相同？它们是否与其他地区的变化同步？植被对气候变化有反应吗？”

This collaborative award examines the regional precipitation-evaporation balance and its effect on ecosystems in the climatically sensitive Yukon Territory. Arctic ecosystems are bellwethers for global climate change and examining their responses to natural climate variability is critical to understanding fundamental earth system processes as well as the potential response of such systems to human-induced changes in climate.By using a combination of biotic (i.e., pollen, charcoal) and abiotic (i.e., elemental and isotopic analyses, magnetic susceptibility, sedimentary analyses) proxies, the investigators will produce high-resolution climate records from the past 1,500 years that examine regional variability in moisture. These results will then be compared with findings from ongoing research across the interior of Alaska. Some of the questions that will be answered by this research are; "Have past changes in precipitation-evaporation balance occurred in the upper Yukon and have they occurred on time scales relevant to humans? Did these changes occur synchronously and in the same direction across the Yukon? Were they synchronous with changes in other regions? Did vegetation respond to climate change?"