Impacts of Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation and Volcanic Forcing on the Late Summer Temperature of the Southern Tibetan Plateau

Abstract

Abstract In this paper, we present a late summer (August–September) temperature reconstruction over the period 1792–2020 based on a tree-ring maximum latewood density (MXD) chronology for the southern Tibetan Plateau (TP). The reconstruction explained 66.2% of the variance in the instrumental temperature records during the calibration period 1960–2020 and captured the warming trend since the 1960s, which would support the current warming on the TP. In addition, a warming hiatus existed during 2001–12 and the last 20 years (2000–20) were the warmest period in the past two centuries. The reconstruction matched other MXD- and mean latewood density (LWD)-based late summer temperature reconstructions from neighboring regions, and fluctuated in synchrony with the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) Northern Hemisphere land surface temperature during 1850–2020. Multitaper method analysis and wavelet analysis revealed significant periodicities of 2–3, 20–30, and 40–60 years in the reconstructed series. Our reconstructed series was very consistent and highly correlated with the Atlantic multidecadal oscillation (AMO). During the warm phase of the AMO, higher pressure and divergent horizontal winds over the TP contribute to warmer summers in the region. In addition, we found that the southern TP experienced the lowest temperature and downward solar radiation in the second year following large volcanic eruptions. The decrease in downward solar radiation may be directly responsible for the occurrence of the lowest temperatures. The results indicate that the AMO and large volcanic eruptions were impacting factors on temperature in our study area.