Articles | Volume 21, issue 6
https://doi.org/10.5194/cp-21-1001-2025
https://doi.org/10.5194/cp-21-1001-2025
Research article
 | 
11 Jun 2025
Research article |  | 11 Jun 2025

Global biome changes over the last 21 000 years inferred from model–data comparisons

Chenzhi Li, Anne Dallmeyer, Jian Ni, Manuel Chevalier, Matteo Willeit, Andrei A. Andreev, Xianyong Cao, Laura Schild, Birgit Heim, Mareike Wieczorek, and Ulrike Herzschuh

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Cited articles

Allen, J. R. M., Forrest, M., Hickler, T., Singarayer, J. S., Valdes, P. J., and Huntley, B.: Global vegetation patterns of the past 140,000 years, J. Biogeogr., 47, 2073–2090, https://doi.org/10.1111/jbi.13930, 2020. 
Alley, R. B.: The Younger Dryas cold interval as viewed from central Greenland, Quatermary Sci. Rev., 19, 213–226, https://doi.org/10.1016/S0277-3791(99)00062-1, 2000. 
Beck, P., Caudullo, G., de Rigo, D., and Tinner, W.: Betula pendula, Betula pubescens and other birches in Europe: distribution, habitat, usage and threats, in: European Atlas of Forest Tree Species, edited by: San-Miguel-Ayanz, J., de Rigo, D., Caudullo, G., Houston Durrant, T., and Mauri, A., Publication Office of the European Union, Luxembourg, 70–73, https://doi.org/10.7892/boris.80789, 2016. 
Berger, A.: Long-term variations of daily insolation and Quaternary climatic changes, J. Atmos. Sci., 35, 2362–2367, https://doi.org/10.1175/1520-0469(1978)035<2362:LTVODI>2.0.CO;2, 1978. 
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Short summary
We present global megabiome dynamics and distributions derived from pollen-based reconstructions over the last 21 000 years, which are suitable for the evaluation of Earth-system-model-based paleo-megabiome simulations. We identified strong deviations between pollen- and model-derived megabiome distributions in the circum-Arctic and Tibetan Plateau areas during the Last Glacial Maximum and early deglaciation and in northern Africa and the Mediterranean region during the Holocene.
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