Description: The pre-industrial millennium is among the periods selected by the Paleoclimate Model Intercomparison Project (PMIP) for experiments contributing to the sixth phase of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (CMIP6) and the fourth phase of the PMIP (PMIP4). The past1000 transient simulations serve to investigate the response to (mainly) natural forcing under background conditions not too different from today, and to discriminate between forced and internally generated variability on interannual to centennial timescales. This paper describes the motivation and the experimental set-ups for the PMIP4-CMIP6 past1000 simulations, and discusses the forcing agents orbital, solar, volcanic, and land use/land cover changes, and variations in greenhouse gas concentrations. The past1000 simulations covering the pre-industrial millennium from 850 Common Era (CE) to 1849 CE have to be complemented by historical simulations (1850 to 2014 CE) following the CMIP6 protocol. The external forcings for the past1000 experiments have been adapted to provide a seamless transition across these time periods. Protocols for the past1000 simulations have been divided into three tiers. A default forcing data set has been defined for the Tier 1 (the CMIP6 past1000) experiment. However, the PMIP community has maintained the flexibility to conduct coordinated sensitivity experiments to explore uncertainty in forcing reconstructions as well as parameter uncertainty in dedicated Tier 2 simulations. Additional experiments (Tier 3) are defined to foster collaborative model experiments focusing on the early instrumental period and to extend the temporal range and the scope of the simulations. This paper outlines current and future research foci and common analyses for collaborative work between the PMIP and the observational communities (reconstructions, instrumental data).

Description: To analyze the global hydroclimate response during the Younger Dryas cold event, we evaluate climate model results that have been constrained with proxy-based temperatures from the North Atlantic region. We find that both the temperature and the hydroclimate response have a clear global signature. A marked cooling is simulated over the North Atlantic Ocean (more than 5 °C) and the downwind continents (2–4 °C). This response is related to the weakening of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation under influence of meltwater discharges. The hydroclimate response is most expressed over Eurasia in a belt between 40 and 60°N, and over Northern Africa in the Sahel region. In both areas, a strong decrease in soil moisture is simulated (up to 20% reduction). In contrast, a striking increase in moisture is found over southeastern North America (15% increase), where southerly atmospheric flow brings moist air to the continent. Outside these areas that are clearly affected by the cold North Atlantic Ocean, the responses of temperature and moisture are decoupled, with different causes for these temperature and hydroclimate responses. In the tropics, the hydroclimate response is governed by the southward shift of the intertropical convergence zone (ITCZ) due to the cooling of the North Atlantic Ocean. This causes drier conditions north of the equator and wetter conditions in the Southern Hemisphere tropics. The associated changes in soil moisture are relatively gradual here, taking up to two centuries to complete, suggesting that the impact of the ITCZ shift on the tropical hydroclimate is building up. Our experiment indicates that Southern Hemisphere continents experienced a small cooling (less than 0.5 °C) during the Younger Dryas, caused by the negative radiative forcing associated with reduced atmospheric methane concentrations and enhanced dust levels. In our simulation, the bi-polar seesaw mechanism is relatively weak, so that the associated warming of the South Atlantic Ocean is not overwhelming the reduction in radiative forcing. Our results thus indicate that in the tropics and/or Southern Hemisphere, the cooling is a response to the negative radiative forcing, while the hydroclimatic changes are predominantly resulting from ITCZ variations. Consequently, when interpreting hydroclimatic proxy records from these regions, data should not be compared directly to key records from high latitudes, such as Greenland ice core stable isotope records.

Description: To analyze the global hydroclimate response during the Younger Dryas cold event, we evaluate climate model results that have been constrained with proxy-based temperatures from the North Atlantic region. We find that both the temperature and the hydroclimate response have a clear global signature. A marked cooling is simulated over the North Atlantic Ocean (more than 5 °C) and the downwind continents (2–4 °C). This response is related to the weakening of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation under influence of meltwater discharges. The hydroclimate response is most expressed over Eurasia in a belt between 40 and 60°N, and over Northern Africa in the Sahel region. In both areas, a strong decrease in soil moisture is simulated (up to 20% reduction). In contrast, a striking increase in moisture is found over southeastern North America (15% increase), where southerly atmospheric flow brings moist air to the continent. Outside these areas that are clearly affected by the cold North Atlantic Ocean, the responses of temperature and moisture are decoupled, with different causes for these temperature and hydroclimate responses. In the tropics, the hydroclimate response is governed by the southward shift of the intertropical convergence zone (ITCZ) due to the cooling of the North Atlantic Ocean. This causes drier conditions north of the equator and wetter conditions in the Southern Hemisphere tropics. The associated changes in soil moisture are relatively gradual here, taking up to two centuries to complete, suggesting that the impact of the ITCZ shift on the tropical hydroclimate is building up. Our experiment indicates that Southern Hemisphere continents experienced a small cooling (less than 0.5 °C) during the Younger Dryas, caused by the negative radiative forcing associated with reduced atmospheric methane concentrations and enhanced dust levels. In our simulation, the bi-polar seesaw mechanism is relatively weak, so that the associated warming of the South Atlantic Ocean is not overwhelming the reduction in radiative forcing. Our results thus indicate that in the tropics and/or Southern Hemisphere, the cooling is a response to the negative radiative forcing, while the hydroclimatic changes are predominantly resulting from ITCZ variations. Consequently, when interpreting hydroclimatic proxy records from these regions, data should not be compared directly to key records from high latitudes, such as Greenland ice core stable isotope records.

Description: Occupying about 14 % of the world's surface, the Southern Ocean plays a fundamental role in ocean and atmosphere circulation, carbon cycling and Antarctic ice-sheet dynamics. Unfortunately, high interannual variability and a dearth of instrumental observations before the 1950s limits our understanding of how marine–atmosphere–ice domains interact on multi-decadal timescales and the impact of anthropogenic forcing. Here we integrate climate-sensitive tree growth with ocean and atmospheric observations on southwest Pacific subantarctic islands that lie at the boundary of polar and subtropical climates (52–54° S). Our annually resolved temperature reconstruction captures regional change since the 1870s and demonstrates a significant increase in variability from the 1940s, a phenomenon predating the observational record. Climate reanalysis and modelling show a parallel change in tropical Pacific sea surface temperatures that generate an atmospheric Rossby wave train which propagates across a large part of the Southern Hemisphere during the austral spring and summer. Our results suggest that modern observed high interannual variability was established across the mid-twentieth century, and that the influence of contemporary equatorial Pacific temperatures may now be a permanent feature across the mid- to high latitudes.

Description: The spatial pattern of Antarctic surface air temperature variability on multi–decadal to multi–centennial time scales is poorly known because of the short instrumental records, the relatively small number of high–resolution paleoclimate observations, and biases in climate models. Here, changes in surface air temperature over Antarctica are reconstructed over the past two millennia using data assimilation constrained by different ice core water isotope records in order to identify robust signals. The comparison between previous statistically based temperature reconstructions and simulations covering the full Common Era driven by natural and anthropogenic forcings shows major discrepancies occurring in the period 1–1000 CE over East Antarctica, with the reconstructions displaying a warming over 1–500 CE that is not reproduced by the simulations. This suggests that the trends in the first millennium deduced from the statistically based reconstructions are unlikely to be entirely forced by external forcings. Our reconstructions show the high sensitivity of the 500-year temperature trend in Antarctica and its spatial distribution to selection of the records for the reconstructions, especially during 1–500 CE. A robust cooling over Antarctica during 501–1000 CE has been obtained in three data assimilation–based reconstructions with a larger magnitude in the WAIS than elsewhere over Antarctica, in agreement with previous estimates with the larger changes than simulated in climate models. The reconstructions for atmospheric circulation indicate that the pattern of temperature changes over 501–1000 CE is related to the positive trend of Southern Annular Mode and a deepening of Amundsen Sea Low. This confirms the role of internal variability in the temperature trends on multi–centennial scales.