Pacific Decadal Oscillation documented in a coral record of North Pacific winter temperature since 1873

The Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO), the leading mode of sea surface temperature (SST) anomalies in the extratropical North Pacific Ocean, has widespread impacts on precipitation in the Americas and marine fisheries in the North Pacific. However, marine proxy records with a temporal resolution that resolves interannual to interdecadal SST variability in the extratropical North Pacific are extremely rare. Here we demonstrate that the winter Sr/Ca and U/Ca records of an annually‐banded reef coral from the Ogasawara Islands in the western subtropical North Pacific are significantly correlated with the instrumental winter PDO index over the last century. The reconstruction of the PDO is further improved by combining the coral data with an existing eastern mid‐latitude North Pacific growth ring record of geoduck clams. The spatial correlations of this combined index with global climate fields suggest that SST proxy records from these locations provide potential for PDO reconstructions further back in time.

[1]  H. Kawahata,et al.  Subtropical coral reveals abrupt early-twentieth-century freshening in the western North Pacific Ocean , 2009 .

[2]  H. Kawahata,et al.  East Asian monsoon to El Niño/Southern Oscillation: A shift in the winter climate of Ishigaki Island accompanying the 1988/1989 regime shift, based on instrumental and coral records , 2008 .

[3]  A. Kaplan,et al.  Interdecadal‐decadal climate variability from multicoral oxygen isotope records in the South Pacific Convergence Zone region since 1650 A.D. , 2008 .

[4]  Thomas M. Smith,et al.  Improvements to NOAA’s Historical Merged Land–Ocean Surface Temperature Analysis (1880–2006) , 2008 .

[5]  R. Steneck,et al.  Coralline alga reveals first marine record of subarctic North Pacific climate change , 2007 .

[6]  Rosanne D'Arrigo,et al.  On the Asian expression of the PDO , 2006 .

[7]  Wei‐Chyung Wang,et al.  A Pacific Decadal Oscillation record since 1470 AD reconstructed from proxy data of summer rainfall over eastern China , 2006 .

[8]  T. D. Mitchell,et al.  An improved method of constructing a database of monthly climate observations and associated high‐resolution grids , 2005 .

[9]  Glen M. MacDonald,et al.  Variations in the Pacific Decadal Oscillation over the past millennium , 2005 .

[10]  C. Deser,et al.  Pacific Interdecadal Climate Variability: Linkages between the Tropics and the North Pacific during Boreal Winter since 1900 , 2004 .

[11]  David L. Peterson,et al.  North Pacific climate recorded in growth rings of geoduck clams: A new tool for paleoenvironmental reconstruction , 2004 .

[12]  Matthew Newman,et al.  ENSO-Forced Variability of the Pacific Decadal Oscillation , 2003 .

[13]  Ze'ev Gedalof,et al.  A multi‐century perspective of variability in the Pacific Decadal Oscillation: new insights from tree rings and coral , 2002 .

[14]  M. Gagan,et al.  Abrupt Decrease in Tropical Pacific Sea Surface Salinity at End of Little Ice Age , 2002, Science.

[15]  N. Mantua,et al.  The Pacific Decadal Oscillation , 2002 .

[16]  Michael Ghil,et al.  ADVANCED SPECTRAL METHODS FOR CLIMATIC TIME SERIES , 2002 .

[17]  R. Villalba,et al.  Tree-ring estimates of Pacific decadal climate variability , 2001 .

[18]  D. Schrag,et al.  Support for tropically‐driven pacific decadal variability based on paleoproxy evidence , 2001 .

[19]  W. White,et al.  Patterns of coherent decadal and interdecadal climate signals in the Pacific Basin during the 20th century , 2001 .

[20]  Z. Gedalof,et al.  Interdecadal climate variability and regime‐scale shifts in Pacific North America , 2001 .

[21]  J. Récy,et al.  Evidence for stronger El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) Events in a Mid-Holocene massive coral , 2000 .

[22]  S. Power,et al.  Inter-decadal modulation of the impact of ENSO on Australia , 1999 .

[23]  J. Wallace,et al.  A Pacific Interdecadal Climate Oscillation with Impacts on Salmon Production , 1997 .

[24]  Shoshiro Minobe,et al.  A 50–70 year climatic oscillation over the North Pacific and North America , 1997 .

[25]  Franco Biondi,et al.  North Pacific Decadal Climate Variability since 1661 , 2001 .