New and Extended Tree-Ring Records of Temperature Variability for the Medieval Warm Period and Little Ice Age from the North American Arctic Treeline

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This award is to support research that will develop new and extend existing tree ring records from the North American Arctic treeline. Since the northern limit of treeline coincides with the southern limit of the Arctic Front, this work will provide a spatial and temporal constraints on the Arctic Front over the last millennium. Field work will be undertaken to collect samples from northern Canada and Alaska. Analyses will include cross-dating, ring width, and measurement of maximum latewood density. All data will be standardized to maximize extraction of low frequency climatic variability. Finally, tree-ring chronologies will be incorporated into dendroclimatic reconstructions of past temperature. The broader impacts of this proposed research are that it will lead to information about the variation and nature of the forest tundra ecotone during a time of rapid environmental and climatic change.