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Global Climate Change Digest
A Guide to Information on Greenhouse Gases and Ozone Depletion
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FROM VOLUME 9, NUMBER 4, APRIL 1996

NEWS...
RESEARCH NEWS

Item #d96apr58

Ocean instability threatens Europe: Experiments with a coupled ocean-atmosphere climate model suggest that a relatively small influx of fresh water could greatly alter the ocean "conveyor" that moves warm water into the North Atlantic and moderates the climate of Western Europe. This raises the possibility that climate change could trigger such a change. (See related papers in Prof. Pubs./Climate Sensitivity and Feedbacks, this Digest issue--Apr. 1996; also New Scientist, p. 20, Nov. 11, 1995.)

Item #d96apr59

Sun-climate links: The long-dismissed idea that the sun could be a major driver of climate change is gaining new adherents as researchers detect the pulse of the sun in the ocean, on land, and in glacial ice. (See news feature in Science, pp. 1360-1361, Mar. 8, 1996, and shorter item in Science News, p. 141, Mar. 2.)

Item #d96apr60

Climate stability: The traditional view of the present interglacial as a period of stable climate is being challenged by diverse evidence from around the globe that climate has behaved erratically during the last few millennia. These shifts complicate forecasts of future climate, as researchers must determine whether they have played a role in recent global warming. (See Overpeck paper in Prof. Pubs./Of Gen. Interest, this Digest issue--Apr. 1996, and article in Science News, pp. 140-141, Mar. 2 1996.)

Item #d96apr61

"Awakenings in the Arctic," R. Macdonald, Nature, pp. 286-287, Mar. 28, 1996. Presentations at the Ocean Sciences Meeting (Feb. 12-16, San Diego) demonstrated how data from submarines, icebreakers and deep-sea moorings have produced synoptic surveys of the ocean undreamed of a decade ago. The new tools provide an unprecedented opportunity to follow perturbations in temperature and in concentrations of chemicals, and to learn how the Arctic Ocean is coupled to other oceans in the context of change.