Recognising bias in Common Era temperature reconstructions

• Authors: BÜNTGEN Ulf; ARSENEAULT Dominique; BOUCHER Etienne; CHURAKOVA SIDOROVA Olga V.; GENNARETTI Fabio; CRIVELLARO Alan; HUGHES Malcolm K.; KIRDYANOV Alexander V.; KLIPPEL Lara; KRUSIC Paul J.; LINDERHOLM Hans W.; LJUNGQVIST Fredrik C.; LUDESCHER Josef; MCCORMICK Michael; MYGLAN Vladimir S.; NICOLUSSI Kurt; PIERMATTEI Alma; OPPENHEIMER Clive; REINIG Frederick; SIGL Michael; VAGANOV Eugene A.; ESPER Jan
• Year of publication: 2022
• Type: Article in Periodical
• Magazine / Source: Dendrochronologia
• MU Faculty or unit: Faculty of Science
• Web: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1125786522000625
• Doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.dendro.2022.125982
• Keywords: Climate variation; Common Era; IPCC; Large-scale network; Multi -proxy reconstruction; Science communication; Tree rings
• Description: A steep decline in the quality and quantity of available climate proxy records before medieval times challenges any comparison of reconstructed temperature and hydroclimate trends and extremes between the first and second half of the Common Era. Understanding of the physical causes, ecological responses and societal consequences of past climatic changes, however, demands highly-resolved, spatially-explicit, seasonally-defined and absolutely-dated archives over the entire period in question. Continuous efforts to improve existing proxy records and reconstruction methods and to develop new ones, as well as clear communication of all uncertainties (within and beyond academia) must be central tasks for the paleoclimate community.