COLUMBIA CLIMATE SCHOOL
A relatively new way of analyzing tree rings has allowed researchers to reconstruct temperatures in Mongolia since 1269 C.E.
A relatively new way of analyzing tree rings has allowed researchers to reconstruct temperatures in Mongolia since 1269 C.E. The new reconstruction confirms that since the 1990s, summer temperatures are the warmest the region has seen in the past eight centuries.
Published in Geophysical Research Letters, the study is led by Nicole Davi, an adjunct senior research scientist at Columbia University’s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory.
Central Asia is one of the fastest-warming places on the planet. In just the past 15 years, summer temperatures have warmed 1.59 degrees C, or nearly 3 degrees F — almost three times the global average rate. During the same period, the region has suffered through extreme and extended droughts.
Read more at: Columbia Climate School
Baatarbileg Nachin and Brendan Buckley collect a tree ring core from a Siberian larch that dated to 1250, August 1998. (Photo Credit: Neil Pederson)
