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. 2022 May 11;12(1):7752.
doi: 10.1038/s41598-022-11299-1.

Modern aridity in the Altai-Sayan mountain range derived from multiple millennial proxies

Olga V Churakova-Sidorova  1   2 , Vladimir S Myglan  3 , Marina V Fonti  3   4 , Oksana V Naumova  3 , Alexander V Kirdyanov  3   5 , Ivan A Kalugin  6 , Valery V Babich  6 , Georgina M Falster  7 , Eugene A Vaganov  3   5 , Rolf T W Siegwolf  4 , Matthias Saurer  8
Affiliations

Modern aridity in the Altai-Sayan mountain range derived from multiple millennial proxies

Olga V Churakova-Sidorova et al. Sci Rep. .

Abstract

Temperature and precipitation changes are crucial for larch trees growing at high-elevation sites covered by permafrost in the Altai-Sayan mountain range (ASMR). To contextualize the amplitude of recent climate fluctuations, we have to look into the past by analyzing millennial paleoclimatic archives recording both temperature and precipitation. We developed annually resolved 1500-year tree-ring cellulose chronologies (δ13Ccell, δ18Ocell), and used these new records to reconstruct the variability in local summer precipitation and air temperature. We combined our new local reconstructions with existing paleoclimatic archives available for the Altai. The data show a strong decreasing trend by ca. 49% in regional summer precipitation, along with a regional summer temperature increase towards the twenty-first century, relative to the preceding 1500 years. Modern dry conditions (1966-2016 CE) in the ASMR are the result of simultaneous summer warming and decreased precipitation. Our new reconstructions also demonstrate that climate change in the ASMR is much stronger compared to the global average.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no competing interests.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Annually resolved δ13Ccell (a) and δ18O cell (b) in Siberian larch tree-ring cellulose chronologies for the period from 516 to 2016 CE. Chronologies are smoothed by a 101-year Hamming window to highlight a centennial scale. The dotted and dashed lines indicate the number of trees analysed.
Figure 2
Figure 2
A newly reconstructed annually-resolved July precipitation chronology was derived from the δ13Ccell for the period from 516 to 2016 CE. Standard errors (SE + and SE−) presented in a grey color (a) and a newly developed regional ASMR—July precipitation reconstruction (ASMR-PJ) based on the combination of δ13Ccell, Rb/Sr and Co/Inc (Eq. 7) for the period from 529 to 2010 CE (b). All chronologies are smoothed by a 101-year Hamming window.
Figure 3
Figure 3
Annually resolved (grey line) and smoothed by a 101-year Hamming window (red line). July air temperature reconstruction are derived from δ18Ocell for the period from 516 to 2016 CE (this study) (a); in comparison with smoothed by a 101-year Hamming window summer June, July, August (JJA) air temperature reconstructions derived from tree-ring width,,, maximum latewood density (MXD). The Teletskoe Lake core sediments (TLs) are derived from the geochemical elements (Ca, Ti, Sr/Br) (this study) and March–November temperature reconstruction inferred from Belukha ice core, and the newly developed July temperature reconstruction derived from δ18Ocell in comparison (b); and newly developed Altai-Sayan mountain range (ASMR) JJA-air temperature reconstruction (ASMR-TJJA) based on tree-ring parameters (δ18Ocell, TRW, MXD) and geochemical elements from the TLs (Ca, Ti, Sr/Br) in comparison with the PAGES 2k global annual (Tann) and smoothed by a 101-year Hamming window (Tsm101) air temperature reconstruction (c).
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