Global vegetation patterns of the past 140,000 years

Aim Insight into global biome responses to climatic and other environmental changes is essential to address key questions about past and future impacts of such changes. By simulating global biome patterns 140 ka to present we aimed to address important questions about biome changes during this interval.

Location Global.

Taxon  Plantae.

Methods Using the LPJ-GUESS dynamic global vegetation model, we made 89 simulations driven using ice-core atmospheric CO2 concentrations, Earth’s obliquity, and outputs from a pre-industrial and 88 palaeoclimate experiments run using HadCM3. Experiments were run for 81 time slices between 1 ka and 140 ka, seven ‘hosing’ experiments also being run, using a 1 Sv freshwater flux to the North Atlantic, for time slices corresponding to Heinrich Events H0 – H7. Using a rule-based approach, based on carbon mass and leaf area index of the LPJ-GUESS plant functional types, the biome was inferred for each grid cell. Biomes were mapped, and the extent and t...