Preliminary Studies of the Relationship between the Dendrochronology of the Northern Peruvian Sapote (Capparis Angulata) and El Nino History

这项建议涉及初步尝试建立厄尔尼诺现象引起的气候变化与秘鲁北部海岸沙漠中发现的一种或多种长寿树木的生长模式之间的关系。已经掌握的初步结果表明，该地区的一些树木——特别是Sapote （Capparis Angulata R. &； P.）——至少可以存活几百年，甚至更长。虽然确定热带沙漠中树木生长年表的任务是艰巨的，但通过比较从不同树的一系列横切面和岩心获得的平均生长模式与选定的树样本的放射性碳定年法，至少可以得出一个粗略的年表。一项建立持续生长模式及其与当地气候变化关系的相关研究将增加我们目前对萨波特的了解，并将为我们的研究工作增加相当大的洞察力。建立过去几个世纪厄尔尼诺变化的代用年表，特别是在秘鲁北部海岸的厄尔尼诺敏感地区，对于我们了解这一神秘但经济上至关重要的现象具有相当大的价值。

This proposal concerns an initial attempt to establish a relationship between climatic variations due to El Nino and growth patterns of one or more long-lived trees found in the desert along the north Peruvian coast. Preliminary results, already in hand, indicate that some trees in this region-specifically the Sapote (Capparis Angulata R. & P.)-live for at least a few hundred years, and perhaps much longer. Although the task of determining a chronology of tree growth in the tropical desert is formidable, it appears that at least a crude chronology is possible by comparing the average growth pattern obtained from a series of transverse sections and cores from separate Sapotes with radiocarbon dating of selected Sapote samples. A concomitant study to establish ongoing growth patterns and their relationship to local climate variations will augment our current understanding of Sapote, and will add considerable insight into our research efforts. The establishment of a proxy chronology of El Nino variability over the past few centuries, particularly in the El Nino sensitive region along the north Peruvian coast, is of considerable value in our search to understand this enigmatic but economically critical phenomenon.