Paleoclimate

Paleoclimate data are derived from Earth's natural climate archives, including tree rings, ice cores, corals, speleothems, and ocean sediments. Such records are used to broaden the sampling of climate variability beyond what is possible from the instrumental record. Paleoclimate data are used to place recent changes into a long-term context, to understand the causes and impacts of climate change, and to explore the behavior of the climate system under vastly different boundary conditions than the present day.

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Climate datasets

Has expert guidance
Cross section of a tree trunk showing alternating light and dark layers of the tree rings. from ucar scied, https://scied.ucar.edu/learning-zone/how-climate-works/tree-rings-and-climate credit pixabay Tree-ring width chronologies: An overview of their use as climate proxies and of available databases

  • Years of record

  • N/A

The width of an annual tree ring is a very simple indicator of the character of that year’s weather, but collectively the global network of tree-ring width measurements…

Main variables and Earth System components

N/A

    • Formats

    • N/A

    • Timestep

    • Annual

    • Collections

    • N/A
Drought atlases from tree rings Drought atlases from tree rings

  • Years of record

  • to

Tree-ring drought atlases provide a paleoclimate analog to modern drought indices, most commonly the Palmer Drought Severity Index (PDSI).  Produced on a regular lat-…

Main variables and Earth System components

Land Drought