Yuxin Zhou

Atmospheric Rivers Shaped Greenland’s Ancient Ice - Eos New simulations reveal how atmospheric rivers influenced Greenland’s ice sheet during the Last Interglacial—offering clues to future melt in a warming world.

Quick writeup about our recent paper on atmospheric rivers during the Last Interglacial in @eos.org!

eos.org/editor-highl...

Job ad for postdoctoral research in ice sheet modeling | Andrea Dutton 🌊 🌊 JOB ALERT!! Looking for a postdoc that does not rely on federal funding?? Looking to live in a city that is routinely ranked as one of the best cities to live in across the entire U.S.? Come jo...

🌊🌊JOB ALERT!! Are you an ice sheet modeler looking for a postdoc that does not rely on federal funding? Come join our research team at University of Wisconsin-Madison to study the physical and human dynamics of sea-level rise. www.linkedin.com/posts/andrea...

Persistent eastern equatorial Pacific Ocean upwelling since the warm Pliocene Upwelling generates a nutrient-rich “cold tongue” in the eastern equatorial Pacific Ocean (EEP), with impacts on global climate, oceanic biological productivity, and the carbon cycle. The cold tongue ...

Today, we published a study long in the making on how upper and subsurface tropical Pacific waters responded (and maybe will adjust) to warmer global climate. Here’s the story of how we got here after 15 years. many authors but shout out @jfarmersalmanac.bsky.social
🌊
www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Time series of standardized streamflow anomaly for the Ganga River from year 700 to 2020 (derived from a hydrological model and from the Monsoon Asia Drought Atlas built from tree rings). The plot shows mostly balanced wet (blue/green bars) and dry (brown bars) years until the 20th century, when the black moving-average line dips sharply after 1990. The 1991–2020 mean (blue horizontal line) is well below the range of previous 1,300 years. Orange dots mark major documented historical droughts, but the recent drying is clearly the most severe.

Observed changes in precipitation and temperature between 1951 and 2020. Spatial distribution of change in (A) annual precipitation (%) and (B) annual mean temperature (°C) between 1951 and 2020 based on the Sen’s slope calculation. Grids with statistically significant trends (P <= 0.05), based on the Mann–Kendall test, are highlighted with stippling. The Inset panels in (A) and (B) represent the interannual variability in precipitation anomaly (%) and temperature (°C) averaged for the Ganga River Basin (blue boundary). The total change in average precipitation and temperature over the GRB during 1951−2020, estimated using the Sen’s slope, is statistically significant (P-value <= 0.05) based on the Mann–Kendall test.

🚨New work🚨 led by Ph.D. student Dipesh Chuphal (IIT Gandhinagar), shows that the recent drying of the Ganga River basin is unprecedented in 1,300 years—more severe than historical famines. This ~multidecadal drying appears forced, but many models do not capture it. ☔️ 🌧️

www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

Link?

Humpback?

Unbelievable experience with the journal Palaeo3. Our manuscript was rejected because… they couldn’t find a second reviewer, and it had been in their system “too long” (7 weeks), according to the editor. In other words, just to preserve their review-speed metrics, they rejected our submission.

Many thanks to coauthors, including @cpallone.bsky.social!! Work done @lamont.columbia.edu

Abrupt weakening of deep Atlantic circulation at the last glacial inception - Nature Communications Zhou et al. report an abrupt weakening of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation at the last glacial inception. The observed circulation slowdown could explain the delayed timing of the atmos...

Earth scientists know a lot more about getting out of an ice age than going into one. We report an episode of AMOC slowdown at 115 thousand years ago that's likely astronomically forced (via sea-ice) and coincides with a delayed drawdown of atmospheric CO2 @natcomms.nature.com rdcu.be/eALD1

Tropical response to ocean circulation slowdown raises future drought risk - Nature An Atlantic meridional overturning circulation slowdown drives widespread shifts in tropical rainfall through the propagation of high-latitude cooling into the tropical North Atlantic.

We all know an AMOC slowdown impacts tropical rainfall, but how exactly? DiNezio et al. point to cooling in the tropical Norht Atlantic as the main pathway. Today in Nature: www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Proposed NOAA budget would shutter Boulder’s world-class climate research laboratories The plan follows through on Project 2025, which called to radically shrink the agency’s research arm.

NCAR is not under NOAA and is not mentioned in the news article www.cpr.org/2025/07/01/p...

Our new study is out in @natcomms.nature.com!
We present a glacial CO₂ reconstruction from the Chinese Loess Plateau over the past 2.6 million years and explore what it reveals about climate sensitivity during the Pleistocene.
🔗 rdcu.be/ewIfh

Great work - congrats!! How does your findings impact the use of the North Atlantic warming hole as a proxy for AMOC strength?

I think I just did my part but it's nice to be recognized!

Schematic illustrations showing source water mixing in the Atlantic Basin during Heinrich Stadial 1 and the Last Glacial Maximum

⚒️ Article: North Atlantic Deep Water formation was only moderately weaker than present during the Last Glacial Period, even when freshwater inputs were high

@paddylaser.bsky.social @unil.bsky.social @fpoeppelmeier.bsky.social @unibe.ch

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

SESAR2 (www.geosamples.org) is rescuing NOAA's Index of Marine and Lacustrine Geological Samples. The IMLGS will be hosted by SESAR2 in the future.

Early Pliocene Shoaling of the Central American Seaway Reconstructed From Foraminifera‐Bound Nitrogen and Oxygen Isotopes Foraminifera-bound nitrogen isotopes trace the early Pliocene restriction of nutrient exchange across the Central American Seaway Geochemical data indicate four phases of seaway shoaling between ...

Just published open-access in @agu.org's Paleo Paleo: A new foraminifera-bound nitrogen isotope perspective on one of geology's evergreen mysteries: The history of the Central American Seaway agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.... (1/a few)...

🚨Opening of the Scientific Ocean Drilling Coordination Office (SODCO). The US' IODP successor is a collaboration between @tamu.bsky.social and @lamontearth.bsky.social.

mailchi.mp/ldeo/sodco-a...

Extra carbon during the Last Glacial Maximum, for example, so I’d love to know how the two scenarios can be reconciled. Thanks in advance!

Such a cool study! I have a question: does the AMOC slowdown lead to an expansion of the carbon-rich Antarctic Bottom Water, therefore partially compensating the loss of North Atlantic absorption of anthropogenic CO2? Circulation reorganization has been proposed as a way for ocean to store (1/2)

NOAA firings hit the birthplace of weather and climate forecasting Dismissed researchers were improving severe weather predictions

Hi - I'd like to share this story of what is happening at NOAA GFDL, where some of my colleagues and I worked until the mass firings at NOAA last week.

"...the birthplace of weather and climate forecasting"

Distinct roles for precession, obliquity, and eccentricity in Pleistocene 100-kyr glacial cycles Identifying the specific roles of precession, obliquity, and eccentricity in glacial-interglacial transitions is hindered by imprecise age control. We circumvent this problem by focusing on the morpho...

This paper by Barker et al resolves many details about how Earth’s orbital wobbles caused glacial cycles of expansion & contraction of ice sheets over the last ~800,000 years 🧵 ⚒️🧪 1/11 www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

I bet every single one of you have heard "it takes a village to raise a child".
Maybe you don't know, but it also takes a village to "raise" scientists. People like Margaret have been pivotal in supporting my work as I grew into a scientist, through rich conversations besides funding.
Heartbroken💔

Not all adaptation strategies to #climatechange will be sufficient for planktonic #foraminifera to survive, an international team of researchers with #MARUM participation comes to this conclusion in the scientific journal @nature.com ➡️ www.marum.de/en/Climate-c...

@juliemeilland.bsky.social

Elizabeth Gray (1831 - 1924) Elizabeth Gray, spent a life in dusty boots, wielding a hammer over rocky bluffs in search of Scotland's Lower Paleozoic fossils.

Another in the Pioneering Women in Earth Sciences series - Elizabeth Gray (1831-1924) - Scotland’s foremost fossil collector, spent her life in well-worn boots, wielding a hammer over rocky bluffs and rubble in search of Lower Paleozoic specimens www.geological-digressions.com/elizabeth-gr... ⚒️🧪

Antarctic ice shelf kept its cool during the last interglacial period An ice core suggests that the West Antarctic Ice Sheet lost ice 125,000 years ago, but not to the extent proposed by some scenarios.

Antarctic ice shelf kept its cool during the last interglacial period
www.nature.com/articles/d41...
@cambridge-earthsci.bsky.social @ercresearch.bsky.social @royalsociety.org @bas.ac.uk

Slowed Response of Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation Not a Robust Signal of Collapse Critical Slowing Down (CSD) indicators can raise a false alarm of a nonexistent collapse when applied to an idealized Atlantic meridional overturning circulation (AMOC) model Applying CSD to the ...

Does an increase in AMOC variability signal an imminent tipping point? In a recent article in GRL (@agu.org), authors explore the possibility of false positives (increased variance but no bistability) depending on gyre circulation intensity.
#AMOC #TippingPoint #Climate

doi.org/10.1029/2024...

Honored to be featured in this article. It shows the power of journalism to find something remarkable in my circuitous journey as a scientist
climatechange.medill.northwestern.edu/yuxin-zhou-a...

Application — paleoCAMP

The application is now open for paleoCAMP 2025 (Paleoclimate Training in Climate Archives, Models, and Proxies)! For graduate students in any area of paleoclimatology, our 2 week summer school is timescale agnostic and multidisciplinary - please apply or share widely! paleoclimate.camp/apply

Abrupt changes in biomass burning during the last glacial period - Nature An increase in wildfire extent and related greenhouse gas emissions can be linked to abrupt climatic changes during the last glacial period.

I'm thrilled to share our new @nature.com paper! We present ice core methane isotope data revealing that past abrupt climate changes likely triggered surges in wildfires, simultaneously driving rapid methane—and possibly CO2—rises 🌎🔥

Read it here 👉 www.nature.com/articles/s41...