To mark its 20th anniversary, Climate of the Past, an interactive journal of the European Geosciences Union, is launching a special webinar series celebrating two decades of leading paleoclimate science.

Each webinar will emphasize the journal’s scientific diversity and impact, featuring two invited talks of 30 minutes from leading researchers across different areas of paleoclimate science. Talks will be followed by a live 30 minutes Q&A session, allowing for discussion and engagement with the broader community.

Summer monsoon brings key water resources to the subtropical continent, which would otherwise be arid. Monsoonal precipitation sustains diverse ecosystems, and supports expansive agriculture and socioeconomic development in the subtropics. Our knowledge continues to grow in research areas such as how the summer monsoon evolved to be its present-day state, its variability through Earth’s history and future trajectories. This seminar brings new views on the fundamental forcing of summer monsoon and insights from geological archives. 

In this webinar, our guest speakers Hu Yongyu (Peking University), and Hai Cheng (Xi’an Jiaotong University).

Talks:

Hu Yongyu (Peking University, China) - Variations of the global monsoon system over tectonic timescales.

The global monsoon system consists of regional monsoons. The concept of the global monsoon reflects the dominant mode of coherent annual variations of precipitation and atmospheric circulations in the tropics and subtropics. In this talk, I will show simulations, together with geological proxies, that the global monsoon system has undergone super-cycles in the Phanerozoic, closely following the supercontinent cycle. I will also demonstrate that global monsoon variations over tectonic timescale are governed by continental configurations: tropical continental area, continental latitudinal location, and continental fragmentation, while temperature or CO₂ concentration has little impact on monsoon variations.

Hai Cheng (Xi’an Jiaotong University, China) - Asian summer monsoon dynamics across various “Quaternary” timescales 

The Asian Summer Monsoon (ASM) is the largest monsoon system on Earth, influencing the lives of billions across the region. Understanding its variability across timescales is therefore essential for assessing both past climate dynamics and future hydroclimatic risks. Over the past two decades, advances in U/Th and U/Pb dating techniques have propelled cave-based proxy records to the forefront of ASM research. Drawing from these new generation of cave oxygen isotope (δ¹⁸O) records, this presentation explores a number of key outstanding issues in Quaternary ASM dynamics across a wide range of timescales from seasonal to tectonic. 

I highlight, in particular, the Mid-Pleistocene Transition (MPT) in the ASM; the prevailing precessional rhythm observed across the ASM domain and their distinct spatial phasing variations – the emerging paradigm of “monsoon system science”; the coupling of the ASM with the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) on multiple-timescales; potential roles for low-latitude and Southern Hemisphere triggers in abrupt climate change; and early warning signals prior ASM tippings in cave records and their future implications. The presentation also touches on cross-timescale interactions within the monsoon system and offers perspectives on evolving monsoon theory.

Conveners:

Ran Feng & Mary Gagen

Speakers:

Hu Yongyu (Peking University, China) - Hu Yongyu is is a professor and dean at Institute of Ocean Research, Peking University, China. Their research interests cover broad areas in present, past and planetary climates. Their research aim is the study of fundamental and frontier problems of Earth and planetary climates. Hu Yongyu's philosophy is to treat the Earth climate as an integrated and dynamic system, which receives energy from solar radiation, dynamically evolves throughout fluid motions, and involves the interplay of the atmosphere and ocean with the interior of Earth. Their approach to these problems is to combine observational data analyses, numerical simulations, and theoretical studies. In addition, Hu Yongyu is an active member of multiple scientific organisations, and includes their role of president of the Beijing Meteorological Society, vice-president of the Chinese Meteorological Society, and is editor of multiple publications such as the Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres Advances in Atmospheric Science, and the Science Bulletin.

Hai Cheng (Xi’an Jiaotong University, China) - Hai Cheng has over the past three decades been at the leading edge in the technical developments of U-series and other techniques to address many fundamental questions in paleoclimatology and global climate change research. As one of world-leading experts, he has focused largely on studies of cave records worldwide, and produced an incredible body of work, which has led to a clearer understanding of the Earth’s climate history on a wide range of timescales. The broad international significance of his contributions is attested by >700 peer-reviewed papers, including 30 in Nature and Science, >80 in Nature and Science Sub-Journals and PNAS (Google Scholar: H-index: 125 and citations: >95000). He is a ‘Highly Cited Researches’ (continuously from 2014 to 2024, Thomson Reuters/Clarivate Analytics). He ranks 8th in the current international ranking of geoscientists

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If you have any questions about the webinar "Climate of the Past 20th Anniversary: Paleomonsoon Variability", please contact us via webinars@egu.eu.

Webinar

Climate of the Past 20th Anniversary: Paleomonsoon Variability

Start time

Wed, 11 Feb 2026 13:00 CET

Duration

ca. 1h 30m

Contact

webinars@egu.eu