Montana State University |
Montana State University |
BOZEMAN -- From the kernel of an idea in Katmandu, the Mountain Research Initiative has grown to global proportions.
The program now coordinates mountain climate research worldwide, from Yellowstone's ecosystem to that of the Andes, Alps and Himalayas surrounding Katmandu, Nepal.
"A team of 20 international scientists came up with a research plan in
Katmandu five years ago that coordinates research findings from the Yellowstone Ecosystem
with that around the world," says Lisa Graumlich, director of Montana State
University's Mountain Research Center.
The Swiss National Science Foundation and its U.S. counterpart are funding this coordination. International attention is focused on mountain areas because data indicate that higher elevations are warming up faster than lowland areas, says Graumlich.
"Climate isn’t just changing in the mountains," she adds. "Globally, temperatures are rising faster in mountain regions than anytime in the past millennium."
In addition, Graumlich and other researchers think mountain area changes will be an early indicator of global climate change. Mountains are attracting new residents at an increasing rate. This desire to live, work and play in mountain areas may turn out to be the greatest driver of change in those ecosystems.
"We are looking at a future of warmer climates and new pressures on natural resources from increasing populations in traditionally rural areas,” she says.
Scientists try to consider all those changes to determine how human actions affect the climate and how climate change, in turn, may affect humans. In recent years, climate conferences have gone from debating whether the earth's climate seems to be changing to how to cope with climate change, says Graumlich, who has attended many of the conferences. She participated in the July conference in Amsterdam on "Challenges of a Changing Earth," and is on the scientific steering committee of the international Mountain Research Initiative.
Generally predictable climate and weather are important for worldwide food production. Predictability also allows readiness to respond to weather-related disasters like hurricanes, floods and fires.
"Societies can adjust to slow changes in average conditions, but extreme weather is difficult to cope with," says Graumlich. "Climate theory says that when you raise the temperature of the earth, you expect more variability, especially in precipitation." She adds that as one part of the world gets hotter, short-term weather fronts may become stronger. That might push a warm air mass further toward a polar area, causing colder air to flow farther into temperate regions. Such changes in the very complex system could make one place unusually cold for a season, even though the worldwide average would be warmer.
And if the system changes wildly from year to year, whether it is an agricultural system or water supplies, we'll need to learn to cope with those extremes."
In studying the climate, Graumlich's work first looks at "what has been" to see whether current weather is outside the norm. Her specialty is tree-ring data, which is gathered by taking a small sample either from a living tree, or, more often, from an ancient dead tree. Each tree describes the weather it has lived through by the size of its growth rings. It can even tell us of the frequency of fire by the presence of scorching at various ages.
Gathering tree-ring data is both difficult most pleasant. On an August trip into the Wind River Range of Wyoming, her team hiked in about 20 miles and over 12,000-foot passes.
"Sometimes it feels more like outward bound than field work!"
Photo: MSU's Lisa Graumlich takes a core sample from a tree in the Wind River Mountain Range of Wyoming.
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Send questions or comments to Carol Flaherty, MSU Communications Services, Bozeman, MT 59717 or email Flaherty at carolf@montana.edu.
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