Early Paleogene Arctic terrestrial ecosystems affected by the change of polar hydrology under global warming: Implications for modern climate change at high latitudes

Our understanding of both the role and impact of Arctic environmental changes under the current global warming climate is rather limited despite efforts of improved monitoring and wider assessment through remote sensing technology. Changes of Arctic ecosystems under early Paleogene warming climate p...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Science China Earth Sciences
Main Authors: Leng Qin, Langlois, Gaytha A., Yang Hong
Format: Report
Language:English
Published: SCIENCE PRESS 2010
Subjects:
Paleogene climate
Arctic ecosystems
global warming
global hydrology
vegetation change
EOCENE THERMAL MAXIMUM
HYDROGEN ISOTOPIC COMPOSITIONS
AXEL-HEIBERG ISLAND
ATMOSPHERIC CO2
EARLY TERTIARY
LATE PALEOCENE
N-ALKANES
MIDDLE EOCENE
EARLIEST EOCENE
RAIN-FOREST
Geology
Geosciences
Multidisciplinary
Arctic
Axel Heiberg Island
Heiberg
Climate change
Global warming
Online Access:http://ir.nigpas.ac.cn/handle/332004/22216
http://ir.nigpas.ac.cn/handle/332004/22217
https://doi.org/10.1007/s11430-010-3081-5
Description
Summary:Our understanding of both the role and impact of Arctic environmental changes under the current global warming climate is rather limited despite efforts of improved monitoring and wider assessment through remote sensing technology. Changes of Arctic ecosystems under early Paleogene warming climate provide an analogue to evaluate long-term responses of Arctic environmental alteration to global warming. This study reviews Arctic terrestrial ecosystems and their transformation under marked change of hydrological conditions during the warmest period in early Cenozoic, the Paleocene and Eocene. We describe a new approach to quantitatively reconstruct high latitudinal paleohydrology using compound-specific hydrogen isotope analysis which applies empirically derived genus-specific hydrogen isotope fractionations to in situ biomolecules from fossil plants. We propose a moisture recycling model at the Arctic to explain the reconstructed hydrogen isotope signals of ancient high latitude precipitation during early Paleogene, which bears implications to the likely change of modern Arctic ecosystems under the projected accelerated global warming.

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