Research articles

Extreme El Niño events cause global disruption of weather patterns and affect ecosystems and agriculture through changes in rainfall. Model projections show that a doubling in the occurrence of such extreme episodes is caused by increased surface warming of the eastern equatorial Pacific Ocean, which results in the atmospheric conditions required for these event to occur.

At present the Pine Island Glacier in West Antarctica is thinning and its grounding line has retreated. This work uses three ice-flow models to investigate the stability of the glacier and finds that the grounding line could retreat a further 40 km, which is equivalent to a rise in sea level of 3.5–10 mm over a 20 year period.

Climate engineering could support conventional mitigation policies but is potentially a controversial approach; therefore, understanding the public’s concerns about its adoption before decisions are made is important. Now research that draws on methods used by corporations to evaluate brands shows that the overall public evaluation of climate engineering is negative.

Little is known about how temperature anomalies affect people’s views about climate change. Research now shows that available information about today’s temperature, even though less relevant than evidence of global patterns, is used to formulate opinions. With experience of abnormal temperatures, people overestimate the frequency of similar past events and belief in global warming increases.

The rate at which species expand their geographic ranges in response to climate warming varies. Now research on British butterflies finds that stable or increasing abundance is a prerequisite for range expansion. This suggests that assessment of trends in abundance could help to improve predictions of the responses of species to climate change.