New! Sign up for our free email newsletter.
Reference Terms
from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Paleoclimatology

Paleoclimatology is the study of climate change taken on the scale of the entire history of the earth. Glaciers are a widely employed instrument in paleoclimatology. The ice in glaciers has hardened into an identifiable pattern, with each year leaving a distinct layer in an ice core. It is estimated that the polar ice caps have 100,000 of these layers or more. Inside of these layers scientists have found pollen, allowing them to estimate the total amount of plant growth of that year by the pollen count. The thickness of the layer can help to determine the amount of rainfall that year. Sediment layers have been studied, particularly those in the bottom of lakes and oceans. Characteristics of preserved vegetation, animals, pollen, and isotope ratios provide information. Sedimentary rock layers provide a more compressed view of climate, as each layer of sediment is made over a period of hundreds of thousands to millions of years. Scientists can get a grasp of long term climate by studying sedimentary rock.

Related Stories
 


Fossils & Ruins News

June 9, 2025

Collapse of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet could be triggered with very little ocean warming above present-day, leading to a devastating four meters of global sea level rise to play out over hundreds ...
A new study has finally confirmed the theory that the cause of extraordinary global tremors in September -- October 2023 was indeed two mega tsunamis in Greenland that became trapped standing waves. Using a brand-new type of satellite altimetry, the ...
New research adds to our understanding of how rapidly rising sea levels due to climate change foreshadow the end of the Great Barrier Reef as we know it. The findings suggest the reef can withstand rising sea levels in isolation but is vulnerable to ...
Researchers have recreated the world's oldest synthetic pigment, called Egyptian blue, which was used in ancient Egypt about 5,000 years ...
A new species of velvet worm, Peripatopsis barnardi, represents the first ever species from the arid Karoo, which indicates that the area was likely historically more forested than at present. In the Cape Fold Mountains, we now know that every ...
A new method could soon unlock the vast repository of biological information held in the proteins of ancient soft tissues. The findings could open up a new era for palaeobiological ...
New techniques used to analyze soft tissue in dinosaur fossils may hold the key to new cancer discoveries. Researchers have analyzed dinosaur fossils using advanced paleoproteomic techniques, a method that holds promise for uncovering molecular data ...
The fossils of ancient salamander-like creatures in Scotland are among the most well-preserved examples of early stem tetrapods -- some of the first animals to make the transition from water to land. Thanks to new research, scientists believe that ...
Anthropologists have examined the societal consequences of global glacier loss. This article appears alongside new research that estimates that more than three-quarters of the world's glacier mass could disappear by the end of the century under ...
Long considered a disease brought to the Americas by European colonizers, leprosy may actually have a much older history on the American continent. Scientists reveal that a recently identified second species of bacteria responsible for leprosy, ...
Spring in the Arctic brings forth a plethora of peeps and downy hatchlings as millions of birds gather to raise their young. The same was true 73 million years ago, according to a new article. The paper documents the earliest-known example of birds ...
Replanting forests can help cool the planet even more than some scientists once believed, especially in the tropics. But even if every tree lost since the mid-19th century is replanted, the total effect won't cancel out human-generated ...

Latest Headlines

updated 12:56 pm ET