Mid-Holocene ENSO: Issues in quantitative model-proxy data comparisons

Abstract

Evaluation of climate model simulations using observed data contributes to the assessment of confidence in model predictions of future climate change. The mid-Holocene represents an opportunity to evaluate model simulations of El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) in comparison with coral proxy evidence of reduced ENSO amplitude. Quantitative comparisons between coral records and model output have been limited by (1) the use of different measures of ENSO amplitude, (2) possible sampling of natural variability in short records, and (3) uncertainty about the stationarity of the relationship between central Pacific sea surface temperature (SST) variability and ENSO signals at the coral site. We e..