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

该奖项将资助开发一类新的气候系统模式，将耦合环流模式（GCM）的空间能力与高分辨率和计算效率高的长期分量（包括冰盖和海洋）相结合。这将允许进行长时间整合，同时考虑不断演变的边界条件和瞬态强迫，包括温室气体变化。该项目的前提是，将复杂的数值气候模式应用于整个新生代特定时间点的孤立快照，有助于了解在广泛的边界条件下的平衡气候敏感性。研究人员认为，这种方法在一定程度上受到限制，因为它没有考虑到气候变化在长时间尺度上的时间连续性。他们假设，要更好地理解新生代气候记录中相对突然的转变和突发事件，需要一种新的建模方法，能够将长期变量（即海洋、冰盖、地球化学循环）整合数百万年，同时考虑相对高频的强迫（如轨道周期）和内部反馈，从而导致非线性行为。具体来说，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南极东部冰的积聚；北半球冰川作用的开始）和代用气候记录中识别的短暂事件（最早中新世冰川作用）。研究人员将使用多种模拟来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视界来增加对地球气候如何从一种平均状态转变到另一种平均状态的了解。Global Imagination投影仪的使用增强了项目的研究和教育方面，增加了在一个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，在旋转的地球上叠加陆地上的气候环流模式，可以帮助研究人员从他们的模型结果中获得新的视角，同时鼓励新的研究途径。同样，允许建模领域之外的人和普通大众看到这样的表现，可以通过激发对旧主题的新思考，从而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.