Changes in Ocean Circulation: Research aims

Historical records and geological data provide evidence of high levels of disruption to the thermohaline circulation and temperature distribution in the ocean during the warm and cold periods, for example of the past 60,000 years. Similar climate change is also to be expected in the future.

The junior research group aims to assess the extent to which changes are being driven by natural climatic variation or by the "greenhouse effect". Spatio-temporal changes in temperature and precipitation will be reconstructed in order to better distinguish between these effects. To this end, the scientists will compare results from old climate models and new models, yet to be developed, with the climate data inferred from drill cores. This comparison also aims at testing proposed climate trends as derived from paleo reconstructions against a physically consistent background provided by models. Throughout model development, a major aim will be to test the models’ flexibility in representing climate conditions fundamentally different from today, assuming that for more reliable future climate predictions, a model should be able to reproduce observed (past) climate variability.