The global monsoon across timescales: coherent variability of regional monsoons

• Published in: Climate of the Past
• Main Authors: Wang, P. X., Wang, B., Cheng, H., Fasullo, J., Guo, Z. T., Kiefer, T., Liu, Z. Y.
• Other Authors: Wang, PX (reprint author), Tongji Univ, State Key Lab Mar Geol, Shanghai 200092, Peoples R China., Tongji Univ, State Key Lab Mar Geol, Shanghai 200092, Peoples R China., Univ Hawaii Manoa, Dept Meteorol, Honolulu, HI 96825 USA., Xi An Jiao Tong Univ, Inst Global Environm Change, Xian 710049, Peoples R China., Univ Minnesota, Dept Earth Sci, Minneapolis, MN 55455 USA., Natl Ctr Atmospher Res, CAS NCAR, Boulder, CO 80301 USA., Chinese Acad Sci, Inst Geol & Geophys, Key Lab Cenozo Geol & Environm, Beijing 100029, Peoples R China., PAGES Int Project Off, CH-3012 Bern, Switzerland., Peking Univ, Sch Phys, Lab Climate Ocean & Atmospher Studies, Beijing 100871, Peoples R China., Univ Wisconsin, Ctr Climat Res, Madison, WI 53706 USA.
• Format: Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: climate of the past 2014
• Subjects: EAST-ASIAN MONSOON; NORTH-ATLANTIC CLIMATE; SOUTH CHINA SEA; INTERTROPICAL CONVERGENCE ZONE; SOUTHWESTERN UNITED-STATES; AUSTRALIAN SUMMER MONSOON; LAST GLACIAL PERIOD; LOESS-SOIL SEQUENCE; RING DELTA-D; EL-NINO/SOUTHERN OSCILLATION; North Atlantic
• Online Access: https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11897/390207; https://doi.org/10.5194/cp-10-2007-2014

Monsoon has earned increasing attention from the climate community since the last century, yet only recently have regional monsoons been recognized as a global system. It remains a debated issue, however, as to what extent and at which timescales the global monsoon can be viewed as a major mode of climate variability. For this purpose, a PAGES (Past Global Changes) working group (WG) was set up to investigate the concept of the global monsoon and its future research directions. The WG's synthesis is presented here. On the basis of observation and proxy data, the WG found that the regional monsoons can vary coherently, although not perfectly, at various timescales, varying between interannual, interdecadal, centennial, millennial, orbital and tectonic timescales, conforming to the global monsoon concept across timescales. Within the global monsoon system, each subsystem has its own features, depending on its geographic and topographic conditions. Discrimination between global and regional components in the monsoon system is a key to revealing the driving factors in monsoon variations; hence, the global monsoon concept helps to enhance our understanding and to improve future projections of the regional monsoons. This paper starts with a historical review of the global monsoon concept in both modern and paleoclimatology, and an assessment of monsoon proxies used in regional and global scales. The main body of the paper is devoted to a summary of observation data at various timescales, providing evidence of the coherent global monsoon system. The paper concludes with a projection of future monsoon shifts in a warming world. The synthesis will be followed by a companion paper addressing driving mechanisms and outstanding issues in global monsoon studies. Geosciences, Multidisciplinary Meteorology & Atmospheric Sciences SCI(E) 1 ARTICLE [e-mail]; [e-mail] 6 2007-2052 10