Climate research encompasses a broad range of activities that aim to understand how natural and human systems respond to climate change. By using data from various disciplines such as atmospheric science, oceanography, geology, and ecology, researchers create holistic views of climate systems. This enables them to assess the impact of current trends on global climate patterns and identify potential future changes.
In the early 1900s, scientists began to draw clear links between human activity and climate change. Engineer Guy Stewart Callendar published a seminal paper in 1938 linking fossil fuel combustion and rising greenhouse gas levels. In the 1950s, Charles Keeling began measuring atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations and producing what is now known as the famous Keeling Curve that graphically displays their rise. By the 1980s, NASA scientist James Hansen was sounding the alarm that “We have entered a new era of global warming.”
Today, scientists use data gathered over long periods, from observatories and satellites (e.g., GOES) to tree rings and ice cores, to reconstruct past climates and develop predictions of future changes. This information is combined with mathematical models of the atmosphere, ocean, land and ice (the cryosphere) that are built upon established laws of physics and run on powerful computers.
The models help us estimate the pace of warming and predict how regional climates may vary. They also test whether purely natural factors, such as solar variations or volcanic eruptions, can explain the observed pattern of changes. Scientists have made significant advances in observations, theory and modeling, and we are now able to project future climate change on a range of timescales, from decades to centuries.
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