Abstract
To improve our understanding of climate variability on decadal to centennial time-scales, it is crucial to use a hierarchy
of climate models in addition to palaeoclimate reconstructions based on proxy data. Climate models give a physically consistent
overview of the global climate on all time-scales. They are useful tools in palaeoclimatology, since: (i) they can be used
to test hypotheses that have been inferred from palaeo-data; and (ii) they can provide plausible explanations of observed
phenomena (e.g., Isarin and Renssen (1999), Kohfeld and Harrison (2000)). In recent years, considerable progress in palaeoclimate
modelling has been made with the extensive use of models that consider the coupling of the different components of the climate
system (atmosphere, ocean, sea-ice, vegetation). The aim of this paper is to inform the palaeo-data community on recent developments
in palaeoclimate modelling, with special reference to the Holocene climate. In the first section, different model types and
experiments are discussed, together with a short overview of Holocene climate modelling studies and differences between models
and palaeo-data. In the second section, three important issues are further illustrated by discussing in detail three studies
that use state-of-the-art models.
Original language | English |
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Title of host publication | Past Climate Variability through Europe and Africa |
Pages | 495-514 |
Publication status | Published - 2004 |