An archive of high-resolution temperature reconstructions over the past 2+ millennia

Abstract

High-resolution temperature reconstructions (typically annually to seasonally resolved) have played a key role in understanding paleoclimate immediately prior to the beginning of the instrumental record, especially when calibrated to form an extension of comparable instrumental data coverage (global, hemispheric, and regional). Such calibration allows the information in the instrumental record to be quantitatively extended backward in time in an objective way, enabling description of much longer term fluctuations in climate than possible with instrumental data alone, although with significantly increased uncertainties inherent in proxy-based reconstructions. This data brief describes a newly integrated archive of nearly all the high-resolution temperature reconstructions of the past 2+ millennia included in NOAA's National Climatic Data Center, from small-regional to global scale, which also have been recalibrated to a standard set of instrumental data. Examination of the spectral structure of the data is additionally provided. Copyright 2010 by the American Geophysical Union.