OnePlanet DTP - Creating high-resolution records of Holocene climate change from the heart of Siberia. (OP202050)

Some of the largest observed changes in global surface temperatures over the last century have been witnessed in Siberia (IPCC, 2013). It is likely that carbon release from melting permafrost will trigger a substantial positive feedback on the climate system, with potentially large impacts on communities and ecosystems in the region. Unfortunately, high-resolution palaeoclimate records for Siberia are few and far between (Sundqvist et al 2014), precluding climate data-model comparisons for Siberia in initiatives to synthesise palaeoclimate data, such as the PAGES 2k Network.
This project will address this issue by producing a number of high-resolution climate records from lakes along a West-East gradient in central Siberia. The project can build on the “DIMA” Network, which supports collaborative UK-Russia palaeoenvironmental research (https://research.ncl.ac.uk/dima), which will ensure access to material from these sites. The project provides an opportunity to work together with Russian collaborators on multi-proxy records and produce high-resolution climate records using, for example, (1) a chironomid-based transfer function, (2) stable oxygen isotopes of aquatic invertebrates, and (3) deuterium isotopes of leaf-waxes (n-alkanes).
These records can then be used to validate climate model output and understand how ongoing warming in Siberia compares with previous periods of climate warming.

Skills training provided: palaeo/limnological sampling/coring and creating chronologies of lake sediment records; chironomid analysis; stable hydrogen/oxygen isotope-based climate reconstructions; use of multivariate statistics and transfer functions in R.