scholarly journals Holocene climates of the Iberian Peninsula: pollen-based reconstructions of changes in the west-east gradient of temperature and moisture

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mengmeng Liu ◽  
Yicheng Shen ◽  
Penelope González-Sampériz ◽  
Graciela Gil-Romera ◽  
Cajo J. F. ter Braak ◽  
...  

Abstract. The Iberian Peninsula is characterised by a steep west-east moisture gradient today, reflecting the dominance of maritime influences along the Atlantic coast and more Mediterranean-type climate further east. Holocene pollen records from the Peninsula suggest that this gradient was less steep during the early to mid-Holocene, possibly reflecting the impact of orbital changes on circulation and thus regional patterns in climate. Here we use 7121 pollen samples from 117 sites covering part or all of the last 12,000 years to reconstruct changes in seasonal temperature and in moisture across the Iberian Peninsula quantitatively. We show that there is an increasing trend in winter temperature at a regional scale, consistent with known changes in winter insolation. However, summer temperatures do not show the decreasing trend through the Holocene that would be expected if they were a direct response to insolation forcing. We show that summer temperature is strongly correlated with plant-available moisture (α), as measured by the ratio of actual evapotranspiration to equilibrium evapotranspiration, which declines through the Holocene. The reconstructions also confirm that the west-east gradient in moisture was considerably less steep than today during the early to mid-Holocene, indicating that atmospheric circulation changes (possibly driven by orbital changes) have been important determinants of the Holocene climate of the region.

Author(s):  
A. Lorrio ◽  
J. Sanmartí

This chapter summarizes current knowledge of the human geography of the Iberian peninsula during the Iron Age. It compares and contrasts different sources (Greek and Latin texts, coins minted by indigenous peoples, and archaeological evidence) to recreate the palaeoethnological panorama of the region and reconstruct the historical processes that led to its formation, including the impact of the Phoenicians and Greeks. This analysis indicates the existence of a linguistically non-Indo-European area, mainly the Mediterranean and Atlantic coastal regions between the Pyrenees and the mouth of the Guadiana, and an Indo-European one in the centre of the peninsula and along the greater part of the Atlantic coast. Ethnic groups of varying size and political importance are attested in both areas. Population growth and iron metallurgy played a crucial role in the formation of this human reality, together with the development of urbanization, which started in the Mediterranean coastal areas and progressively spread.


2020 ◽  
Vol 21 (11) ◽  
pp. 2439-2456
Author(s):  
Emily A. Slinskey ◽  
Paul C. Loikith ◽  
Duane E. Waliser ◽  
Bin Guan ◽  
Andrew Martin

AbstractAtmospheric rivers (ARs) are long, narrow filamentary regions of enhanced vertically integrated water vapor transport (IVT) that play an important role in regional water supply and hydrometeorological extremes. Here, an AR detection algorithm is applied to global reanalysis from Modern-Era Retrospective Analysis for Research and Applications, version 2 (MERRA-2), to objectively and consistently characterize ARs regionally across the continental United States (CONUS). The characteristics of AR and associated precipitation are computed at the gridpoint scale and summarized over the seven U.S. National Climate Assessment regions. ARs are most frequent in the autumn and winter in the West, spring in the Great Plains, and autumn in the Midwest and Northeast. ARs show regional and seasonal variability in basic geometry and IVT. AR IVT composites reveal annually consistent northeastward-directed moisture transport from the Pacific Ocean in the West, whereas moisture transport patterns vary seasonally across the Southern Great Plains and Midwest. Linked AR precipitation characteristics suggest that a substantial proportion of extreme events, defined as the top 5% of 3-day precipitation totals, are associated with ARs over many parts of CONUS, including the East. Regional patterns of AR-associated precipitation highlight that seasonally varying moisture transport and lifting mechanisms differ between the East and the West where orographic lifting is key. Our study aims to contribute a comprehensive and consistent CONUS-wide, regional-scale analysis of ARs in support of ongoing NCA efforts. Given the CONUS-wide role ARs play in extreme precipitation, findings motivate continued study of associated climate change impacts.


2020 ◽  
pp. 03-13
Author(s):  
Sajjad Hussain SAJJAD ◽  
Nadège Blond

Quetta is an important economic, historical and culturally a rich city located in the south-west of Pakistan. Like many other cities of the world, Quetta faced massive urbanization during last three decades. It has 1.1 million populations. The consequences of rapid urbanization in Quetta city are significant through changing urban area’s temperatures than its nearby regional areas as a result of alteration of natural land cover change into built-surfaces at city scale. In this context, the objective of this study is to explore the effect of urbanization on variability of minimum (dTn) and maximum (dTx) temperature trends of Quetta city by comparing with non-urban regional stations. For this purpose, first the evolution of urbanization during 1980s to 2013 was analysed by using satellite image processing techniques for the years 1989, 2000 and 2013. To study the impact of urbanization on dTn and dTx of Quetta city, the time series data of daily average monthly minimum (Tn) and maximum (Tx) temperatures ranging from 1947 to 2013 of Quetta city and the seven regional stations were analysed by using linear regression. The results show that during last twenty years, urban population and urban surface area increased to 80% and 194%, respectively. The variation in annual and seasonal temperature trends depicted that Tn and Tx at Quetta city are increasing more than the regional stations and Tn increased faster than Tx at urban and regional scale except winter season.


2019 ◽  
Vol 77 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-11
Author(s):  
M Quinzán ◽  
J Castro ◽  
E Massutí ◽  
L Rueda ◽  
M Hidalgo

Abstract Overexploitation and climate change are increasingly causing unanticipated changes in marine ecosystems such as higher variability in fish recruitment or shifts in species dominance and distribution that alter the productivity of fish stocks. This study analyses how external and internal drivers influence population dynamics of hake (Merluccius merluccius), white anglerfish (Lophius piscatorius), four-spot megrim (Lepidorhombus boscii), and horse mackerel (Trachurus trachurus) of Iberian Peninsula waters of the Northeast Atlantic across different spatiotemporal scales. Available spawning stock biomass and recruitment have been used as biological data, whereas fishing mortality, demographic data as well as climatic and oceanographic data have been used as drivers. The obtained results indicate that population dynamics of these species are mainly driven by oceanographic variability at regional scale along with fishing pressure and demographic factors, while the impact of large-scale climate indices was minimal. The identified variables represent relevant oceanographic regional processes candidate to be potentially integrated into the stock assessment models and management procedures of these important fishery resources.


2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (22) ◽  
pp. 16955-16984
Author(s):  
Paul D. Hamer ◽  
Virginie Marécal ◽  
Ryan Hossaini ◽  
Michel Pirre ◽  
Gisèle Krysztofiak ◽  
...  

Abstract. This paper presents a modelling study on the fate of CHBr3 and its product gases in the troposphere within the context of tropical deep convection. A cloud-scale case study was conducted along the west coast of Borneo, where several deep convective systems were triggered on the afternoon and early evening of 19 November 2011. These systems were sampled by the Falcon aircraft during the field campaign of the SHIVA project and analysed using a simulation with the cloud-resolving meteorological model C-CATT-BRAMS at 2×2 km resolution that represents the emissions, transport by large-scale flow, convection, photochemistry, and washout of CHBr3 and its product gases (PGs). We find that simulated CHBr3 mixing ratios and the observed values in the boundary layer and the outflow of the convective systems agree. However, the model underestimates the background CHBr3 mixing ratios in the upper troposphere, which suggests a missing source at the regional scale. An analysis of the simulated chemical speciation of bromine within and around each simulated convective system during the mature convective stage reveals that >85 % of the bromine derived from CHBr3 and its PGs is transported vertically to the point of convective detrainment in the form of CHBr3 and that the remaining small fraction is in the form of organic PGs, principally insoluble brominated carbonyls produced from the photo-oxidation of CHBr3. The model simulates that within the boundary layer and free troposphere, the inorganic PGs are only present in soluble forms, i.e. HBr, HOBr, and BrONO2, and, consequently, within the convective clouds, the inorganic PGs are almost entirely removed by wet scavenging. We find that HBr is the most abundant PG in background lower-tropospheric air and that this prevalence of HBr is a result of the relatively low background tropospheric ozone levels at the regional scale. Contrary to a previous study in a different environment, for the conditions in the simulation, the insoluble Br2 species is hardly formed within the convective systems and therefore plays no significant role in the vertical transport of bromine. This likely results from the relatively small quantities of simulated inorganic bromine involved, the presence of HBr in large excess compared to HOBr and BrO, and the relatively efficient removal of soluble compounds within the convective column.


Author(s):  
Victor Manuel Simões Filipe

Although usually considered the most important city of Lusitania - after Augusta Emerita - and the main maritime harbour of the whole Atlantic peninsular façade, there remains a generalized absence of studies that highlight the role that Olisipo played in the most western of the Roman provinces’ economy and commercial relations. This work aims to address that absence, by focusing on the research on Olisipo, located at the Tagus estuary, during the period encompassing the Republic and the Principate, and based on the study of amphorae. The dataset resulting from the analysis of the amphorae from Lisbon discloses the existence of a vast network of commercial relations with the diverse areas of the Mediterranean throughout all of the considered chronology, thus revealing a cosmopolitan city, with an active and central role in the complex commercial exchanges of the West of Iberian Peninsula with the rest of the Roman Empire. These results underline Olisipo’s importance as a trading post in the Atlantic coast during the Roman period, a role that has been recognized long ago, allowing to draw in a more accurate way how the city’s economic history was shaped.


2012 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
pp. 45-72
Author(s):  
Morteza Karimi-Nia

The status of tafsīr and Qur'anic studies in the Islamic Republic of Iran has changed significantly during recent decades. The essay provides an overview of the state of Qur'anic studies in Iran today, aiming to examine the extent of the impact of studies by Western scholars on Iranian academic circles during the last three decades and the relationship between them. As in most Islamic countries, the major bulk of academic activity in Iran in this field used to be undertaken by the traditional ʿulamāʾ; however, since the beginning of the twentieth century and the establishment of universities and other academic institutions in the Islamic world, there has been increasing diversity and development. After the Islamic Revolution, many gradual changes in the structure and approach of centres of religious learning and universities have occurred. Contemporary advancements in modern sciences and communications technologies have gradually brought the institutions engaged in the study of human sciences to confront the new context. As a result, the traditional Shīʿī centres of learning, which until 50 years ago devoted themselves exclusively to the study of Islamic law and jurisprudence, today pay attention to the teaching of foreign languages, Qur'anic sciences and exegesis, including Western studies about the Qur'an, to a certain extent, and recognise the importance of almost all of the human sciences of the West.


Paragraph ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 42 (3) ◽  
pp. 333-350
Author(s):  
Kaya Davies Hayon

This article argues that Mariam uses its eponymous heroine's lived and embodied experiences of veiling to explore the impact of French secular legislation on Muslim schoolgirls' everyday lives in France. Interweaving secularism studies, feminism and phenomenology, I argue that the film portrays the headscarf as the primary means by which its protagonist is able to resist male patriarchal authority and negotiate her hybrid subjectivity. I conclude that Mariam offers a nuanced representation of veiling that troubles the perceived distinctions between Islam and secularism, oppression and freedom, and the veil and feminism in France and the West.


2019 ◽  
Vol 62 (11) ◽  
pp. 144-153
Author(s):  
Alexander S. Zapesotsky

Book Review: P.P. Tolochko. Ukraine between Russia and the West: Historical and Nonfiction Essays. Saint Petersburg: Saint Petersburg University of Humanities and Social Sciences, 2018. - 592 pp. ISBN 978-5-7621-0973-4This author discusses the problem of scientific objectivity and reviews a book written by the medievalist-historian P.P. Tolochko, full member of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine (NASU), honorable director of the NASU Institute of Archaeology. The book was published by the Saint Petersburg University of Humanities and Social Sciences in the autumn of 2018. The book presents a collection of articles and reports devoted to processes in Ukraine and, first of all, in Ukrainian historical science, which, at the moment, is experiencing an era of serious reformation of its interpretative models. The author of the book shows that these models are being reformed to suit the requirements of the new ideology, with an obvious disregard for the conduct of objective scientific research. In this regard, the problem of objectivity of scientific research becomes the subject of this review because the requirement of objectivity can be viewed not only as a methodological requirement but also as a moral and political position, opposing the rigor of scientific research to the impact of ideological, political and moral systems and judgments. It is concluded that in this sense the position of P.P. Tolochko can be considered as the act of profound ethical choice.


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