Scientists have observed for years that the Earth's tropics are widening in connection with complex changes in climate and weather patterns.
But in recent years, it appeared the widening was outpacing what models predicted, suggesting other factors were at work. A new paper co-authored by Indiana University Bloomington researcher Paul Staten, however, finds that the most up-to-date models and the best data match up reasonably well.
"If we compare the observed trends of how the tropics have widened to modeling trends, it's actually not outside of what the models predict," said Staten, assistant professor of atmospheric sciences in the College of Arts and Sciences. Staten is an affiliated researcher with the IU Environmental Resilience Institute, which was established under Prepared for Environmental Change, the second initiative funded by the university's Grand Challenges Program.
The paper, "Re-examining Tropical Expansion," was published in the journal Nature Climate Change. Additional authors include Jian Lu of the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, Kevin Grise of the University of Virginia, Sean Davis of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in Colorado and Thomas Birner of Ludwig Maximilians University Munich in Germany.
Staten said the research should add confidence to predictions based on current climate models.
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Image via Tim J. Keegan
