Climate, reef & proxy modelling – Climate & proxy advanced statistics

This research topic aims to apply advanced statistical methods to coral proxy records and instrumental datasets of ocean and atmosphere variability. Research aims to study simulations from coupled atmosphere-ocean general circulation models in comparison with coral estimates of climate and environmental variability derived from Topic A and Topic B and public databases.

Pseudo proxy experiments, proxy system forward modelling and palaeoclimate data assimilation techniques will progress the evaluation of climate models and proxy-based reconstructions towards a comprehensive understanding of tropical marine climate variability. These techniques will be explored on seasonal, interannual and decadal timescales, coupling with the development of environmental stress related metrics of coral reef ecosystem resilience.

Overarching research questions

Can we investigate tropical climate and reef ecosystem dynamics using pseudo proxy experiments, proxy system forward modelling and cross-scale dependencies?

Can we improve coral proxy data assimilation for climate field reconstruction, mathematical descriptions of proxy response functions to temperature, and objective error estimates?

What are the causes for apparent mismatches between climate model and coral proxy estimates of tropical sea surface temperature variability?

Can we project coral bleaching dynamics and coral reef ecosystem changes with improved regional projections of tropical climate trends, modes of variability and extreme events?