NONLINEAR GLOBAL CHANGE DURING THE LAST 6 MILLION YEARS : A MULTIVARIATE THRESHOLD MODEL FOR PLIO-PLEISTOCENE CLIMATE

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Project objective

Research objectives and content Quantifying the future behaviour of the climate system due to an anthropogenically induced greenhouse trend" is an important field in current climate research. In this project the global Plio-Pleistocene climate evolution is investigated, which consists of several transition steps from a "greenhouse" to an "icehouse" climate. The observations show that also on Plio-Pleistocene time scales we face a complex climate system whose variables (ice volume, atmospheric carbon dioxide, etc.) interact nonlinearly and produce multiple and abrupt transitions, including threshold phenomena. In order to yield a better understanding of the role of the significant climate variables and their interactions for climatic changes, it is essential to incorporate, in addition to simple dynamical models, time series models into the stochastic description of climatic variability. Therefore, a multivariate threshold time series model for Plio-Pleistocene climate shall be developed. The nonlinear threshold and multivariate form accounts for the observed complex phenomena. It will constitute the first time series model for Plio-Pleistocene climate and the first application of climate data to multivariate threshold modelling. We expect answers to the following questions: (1) which climate variables play (at what time) a major role, (2) what is the degree of their interaction, (3) are the observed Plio-Pleistocene climate transitions accompanied by changes in thec threshold model parameters, (4) what kind of stochastic components have an influence, (5) how good is the prognostic capability of the model. Training content (objective, benefit and expected impact) Our previous work on Plio-lPleistocene climate time series analysis (Mudelsee and Stattegger 1996) and dynamical climate modelling (Mudelsee and Schulz 1996) demands the enrichment by statistical threshold time series modelling. H. Tong and his group, leading in this domain, would guarantee a maximum training benefit for us. With our experience in interdisciplinary research, we will attain successfully the research objectives, which demand an intensive co-operation between palaeoclimatologists and mathematicians. Stressing the time scale invariance of the methods, we envisage future applications, e. g., man-made short-term climatic change. "

Original text from CORDIS.

Participants

• UNIVERSITY OF KENT AT CANTERBURY · CanterburyCoordinatorUnited Kingdom
• Not availableCity levelGermany

Links

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