Title       : Climatic and Vegetational Oscillations During the Last Glacial-Interglacial
               Transition in Alaska
Type        : Award
NSF Org     : ATM 
Latest
Amendment
Date        : July 9,  1999       
File        : a9996064

Award Number: 9996064
Award Instr.: Continuing grant                             
Prgm Manager: Jay S. Fein                             
	      ATM  DIVISION OF ATMOSPHERIC SCIENCES        
	      GEO  DIRECTORATE FOR GEOSCIENCES             
Start Date  : August 20,  1998    
Expires     : March 31,  2000      (Estimated)
Expected
Total Amt.  : $178127             (Estimated)
Investigator: Feng Sheng  . Hu fshu@life.uiuc.edu  (Principal Investigator current)
              Emi  . Ito  (Co-Principal Investigator current)
              Herbert E. Wright  (Co-Principal Investigator current)
Sponsor     : U of Ill Urbana-Champaign
	      801 South Wright Street
	      Champaign, IL  61820    217/333-2186

NSF Program : 1530      PALEOCLIMATE PROGRAM
Fld Applictn: 
Abstract    :

     9619583  Hu    Evidence is compelling from the circum-North Atlantic and 
     from other parts of the globe that climatic warming  during the last
     glacial-interglacial transition (LGIT) was  punctuated by short-lived reversals
     to near-glacial conditions.  In  Alaska paleoecological and stable-isotope data
     from scattered sites  strongly suggest the existence of short-lived climatic
     events  during the LGIT.  This PALE/ARCSS award supports a project to  acquire
     high-temporal resolution records of vegetation and climate  during the LGIT by
     analyzing a suite of proxy indicators in  sediment cores from lakes across
     three sub-regions of Alaska.   Vegetational reconstructions will be based on
     pollen, spore, and  plant-macrofossil records supplemented by carbon-content
     and  magnetic-susceptibility stratigraphies.  The complementary  properties of
     these proxies will allow the identification of the  most plausible
     paleoenvironmental scenarios.  The results from this  project will be used to
     assess the timing, geographic extent,  character, and magnitude of climatic and
     vegetational oscillations  during the LGIT in Alaska.  As part of the
     longitudinal  (circumarctic) database from PALE and the latitudinal database
     form  PEP-I, paleorecords from this project should offer insights into  the
     linkages of North Pacific high-latitudes to the global climate  system and the
     mechanisms causing abrupt climatic changes.