Highlight articles

Decoded Antarctic snow accumulation history reconciles observed and modeled trends in accumulation and large-scale warming patterns

Snow accumulation on the Antarctic Ice Sheet could increase with greenhouse warming, storing water that would otherwise raise sea level. Employing multiple Earth system model simulations and reconstructions, we detect a warming-driven increase in accumulation consistent with greenhouse gas forcing, but observations can only be matched if wind and meltwater impacts on large-scale surface warming patterns are accounted for. This implies that predictions ignoring these effects are overconfident.

Assessing Earth system responses in mitigation scenarios with activity-driven simulation of carbon dioxide removal

Earth system models can simulate CO₂ removal by representing the activity that draws down atmospheric CO₂, e.g. growing bioenergy crops for energy production with carbon capture and storage or enhancing the oceans’ alkalinity. We describe a simulation framework, spanning the modeling chain from integrated assessment to Earth system models, that allows separating the intrinsic efficiency of CO₂ removal and the overall atmospheric CO₂ reduction, the latter being affected by Earth system feedbacks.

Ocean dynamics amplify remote warming effects of reforestation

Reforestation is a key strategy for tackling climate change, but forests influence climate beyond carbon storage, and some effects can cause warming in distant regions, offsetting their cooling benefits. Using a global climate model, we studied how oceans mediate these distant effects over centuries. We found that ocean processes amplify the warming in distant regions, particularly at high latitudes, highlighting the importance of considering the full long-term climate response of reforestation.

Global hyper-resolution modeling of historical and future groundwater dynamics

We simulated how global groundwater levels have changed in the past and how they might change in the future. By improving model accuracy and using hyper-resolution data, we can now see where water tables are falling or rising across the world at 1km resolution. These results help communities and decision-makers plan for more sustainable water use in a changing climate.

Hysteresis and irreversibility in permafrost physical response to increase and decrease of CO₂ emissions

We investigated a response of permafrost using an Earth system model driven by an idealized overshooting carbon emission scenario, and found that the permafrost response to warming and cooling is reversible in the area but irreversible in its property. The permafrost response shows hysteresis, arising from a slow soil response tied to heat conductivity and specific heat of water phase change. A carbon release from thawed permafrost accounts for 0.6–41% of the cumulative carbon emission.

Catalogue of strong nonlinear surprises in ocean, sea-ice, and atmospheric variables in CMIP6

We present a first catalogue of abrupt changes/state transitions in ocean, sea-ice, and atmospheric variables in future Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 6 climate scenarios. We find many models that show Arctic sea-ice disappearance, North Atlantic winter mixed-layer collapse and/or subsequent transition of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation to a weak state. We find more abrupt changes/state transitions than in previous work at lower global warming levels.

New insights into decadal climate variability in the North Atlantic revealed by data-driven dynamical models

We use artificial intelligence to learn simple equations from historical climate data that describe how North Atlantic ocean temperature, air pressure and rainfall vary and influence each other over decades. Analysing the model's behaviour and equation terms, we find rainfall strongly feeds back on both the ocean and the atmosphere. These interactions are well captured by the models and allow rainfall to be predicted over the ocean, and nearby regions such as Europe over coming decades.

Climate models with moderate climate sensitivity best simulate the magnitude of Earth's energy imbalance

Observations show an increasing imbalance between how much energy the Earth absorbs from the Sun and emits back to space, leading to climate change. We evaluate how well climate models simulate both the magnitude and trend of the imbalance. We find that models capture the magnitude but underestimate the trend, which is not related to how models handle volcanic aerosols when switching to future scenarios. The models that best simulate the magnitude are the ones with moderate climate sensitivity.

Chaotic fluctuations in Greenland ice streams limit predictability of ice sheet collapse

This model study sets out to investigate how the collapse of the Greenland ice sheet to a virtually ice-free state due to increasing temperatures depends on the rate of this increase. We find oscillations in ice volume on millennial timescales that impact the time it takes before the ice sheet collapses, concluding that there is a mode of deterministic chaos internal to the ice sheet dynamics.

Atmospheric river trajectories organise along a global transport network

Atmospheric rivers (ARs) move vast amounts of water through the atmosphere and often cause weather extremes, yet they are usually studied as regional events. Using 84 years of mapped AR trajectories, we reveal the global "roadmap" of ARs, a transport network of high-activity hubs, sparse atmospheric highways & hierarchical basins. Our approach shows how water vapor is systematically channelled through an atmospheric transport network, offering new ways to study changes in the global water cycle.

GMPV Geochemistry, Mineralogy, Petrology & Volcanology Highlight articles

Highlight articles

Information for

External links