Collaborative Research: Time-Continuous Climate Simulations of Abrupt Events and Transitions through the Cenozoic

该奖项资助开发一类新的气候系统模型，将耦合大气环流模型（GCM）的空间能力与高分辨率和计算效率高的长期组件（包括冰盖和海洋）相结合。这将允许长时间的积分，同时考虑到不断变化的边界条件和瞬态强迫，包括温室气体的变化。 该项目的前提是，复杂的数值气候模式应用于新生代特定时间点的孤立快照，有助于了解各种边界条件下的平衡气候敏感性。研究人员坚持认为，这种方法在某种程度上是有限的，因为它不能解释长期气候变化的时间连续性。他们假设，要更好地理解新生代气候记录中认识到的相对突然的转变和突然的事件，需要一种新的建模方法，能够对长期变量进行数百万年的整合（即，海洋，冰盖，地球化学循环），同时考虑相对高频率的强迫（例如，具体而言，研究人员将模拟过渡性气候变化（始新世-渐新世冷却和南极冰川作用;中新世中晚期冷却和东南极冰的积累;北方半球冰川作用的开始）和瞬态事件（最早的中新世冰川作用）。研究人员将使用多个模拟，试图确定与以下因素相关的主要强迫和重要过程：1）物理气候成分，反馈和相互作用; 2）轨道，温室气体和构造强迫在新生代气候变率中的作用。这项研究的结果有可能通过检查关键的新生代时间范围来增加地球气候如何从一个平均状态过渡到另一个平均状态的知识。全球想象投影仪的使用增强了项目的研究和教育方面，增加了在球形投影上显示模型结果的能力，该投影以研究人员选择的任何方式分层。例如，将气候环流模式叠加在旋转的地球仪上的陆地上，可以帮助研究人员对他们的模型结果获得新的视角，同时鼓励新的研究途径。同样，允许那些建模领域之外的人和普通公众看到这些表示可以通过激发对旧主题的新思考来更好地理解气候过程。

This award funds the development of a new class of climate system models combining the spatial capabilities of coupled General Circulation Models (GCM) with highly resolved and computationally efficient long-term components including ice sheets and oceans. This will allow for long temporal integrations while accounting for evolving boundary conditions and transient forcing, including greenhouse gas variations. The premise for the project is that the application of sophisticated numerical climate models to isolated snapshots at specific time points through the Cenozoic has contributed to an understanding of equilibrium climate sensitivity under a wide range of boundary conditions. The researchers maintain that such an approach is somewhat limited by failing to account for the time-continuous nature of climate change over long time scales. They postulate that a better understanding of relatively sudden transitions and abrupt events recognized in Cenozoic climate records requires a new modeling approach capable of multi-million year integrations of long-term variables (i.e., oceans, ice sheets, geochemical cycles) while accounting for relatively high frequency forcing (e.g., orbital cycles) and internal feedbacks contributing to non-linear behavior.Specifically, the researchers will simulate both transitional climate shifts (Eocene-Oligocene cooling and Antarctic glaciation; Middle-Late Miocene cooling and the buildup of East Antarctic ice; onset of Northern Hemisphere glaciation) and transient events (earliest Miocene glaciation) recognized in proxy climate records. The researchers will use multiple simulations in an attempt to identify the primary forcing and important processes associated with: 1) physical climate components, feedbacks, and interactions; and 2) the role of orbital, greenhouse gas, and tectonic forcing in Cenozoic climate variability. Results from this research have the potential to add to the knowledge of how Earths climate transitions from one mean state to another by examining key Cenozoic temporal horizons. The use of a Global Imagination projector enhances the research and education aspects of the project by adding the ability to display model results on a spherical projection that is layered in any manner that the researcher chooses. Superimposing climatic circulation patterns over landmasses on a rotating globe, for example, can help researchers gain a new perspective on their model results while encouraging new avenues of inquiry. Similarly, allowing those outside of the field of modeling and members of the general public to see such representations could lead to greater understanding of climate processes by spurring new thoughts on old subjects.