Collaborative Research: Millennial-Length Histories of Northeastern Pacific Climate Variability from Bivalve Mollusks and Trees

该项目的总体目标是利用包括海洋双壳类太平洋象象蚌（Panopea generosa）生长增量、树木年轮年表和热带珊瑚生长增量记录在内的古气候代用数据，生成东北太平洋地区连续的、每年解决的千年海洋气候历史。该地区的气候变率在北美西部的社会经济和环境动态中发挥着重要作用，对渔业生产、森林生长、野火、干旱和积雪具有明确的影响。在过去十年中，该地区经历了反复的极端热浪，深刻影响了海洋生态系统和邻近的陆地系统。然而，对于1900年代以前东北太平洋的气候变率以及当前气候在多大程度上是非典型的，存在相当大的不确定性。首先，本研究旨在重建东北太平洋海表温度作为地球气候系统中气候和气候变率的重要强迫机制，但相对较少受到仪器观测、古气候资料和一般气候环流模式的约束。该项目旨在解决关于早期树木年轮重建之间不一致的问题以及海洋和陆地系统之间时间变化联系的可能性。此外，将通过综合珊瑚记录和El Niño南方涛动的现有重建来评估温带和热带太平洋区域之间的长期关系。东北太平洋古气候重建可以为古气候记录、现代观测和年际到百年时间尺度的半球气候模式数据集之间的比较提供独特的基准。潜在的更广泛影响（bi）包括开发潜在的高影响气候代理，支持博士生，为本科生开发基于树木年轮学课程的本科生研究经验（CURE），在树木年轮研究部门和生物圈2的大厅中安装展品，培训讲解员，以及建立一个关于定量古气候技术的视频Youtube频道。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The general goal of this project is to produce a continuous, annually resolved, and millennial-length marine climate history of the northeast Pacific Ocean region using a combination of data from paleoclimate proxies involving growth increments of the marine bivalve Pacific geoduck (Panopea generosa), tree-ring chronologies, and tropical coral growth-increment records.Climate variability in the region plays a fundamental role in the socioeconomic and environmental dynamics of western North America with clearly established implications for fisheries production, forest growth, wildfire, drought, and snowpack. Over the past decade, the region has experienced repeated and extreme heatwaves that profoundly impacted marine ecosystems and adjacent terrestrial systems. Yet, considerable uncertainty exists as to northeastern Pacific climate variability prior to the 1900s and the extent to which current climate is atypical.Foremost, this research aims to reconstruct northeast Pacific Ocean sea-surface temperatures as a significant forcing mechanism of climate and climate variability in Earth’s climate system but which is relatively poorly constrained by instrumental observations, paleoclimate data, and general climate circulation models. This project seeks to address lingering questions regarding poor agreement among earlier tree-ring reconstructions and the possibility of time variant linkages across marine and terrestrial systems. Moreover, long-term relationships between the extratropical and tropical Pacific region will be assessed by integrating coral records and existing reconstructions of the El Niño Southern Oscillation. Northeastern Pacific paleoclimate reconstructions may yield unique benchmarks for comparison among paleoclimate records, modern observations, and model datasets of hemispheric climate from interannual to centennial timescales. The potential Broader Impacts (B.I.) include development of a potential high-impact climate proxy, support for a doctoral student, development of a dendrochronology course-based undergraduate research experiences (CURE) for undergraduate students, installation of exhibits into the lobbies of the tree-ring-research dept and in Biosphere2, training of docents, and building a Youtube channel of videos regarding quantitative paleoclimate techniques.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.