Global lake thermal regions shift under climate change

Maberly, S. C. et al. (2020) Global lake thermal regions shift under climate change. Nature Communications, 11, 1232. (doi: 10.1038/s41467-020-15108-z) (PMID:32144247) (PMCID:PMC7060244)

Abstract

Water temperature is critical for the ecology of lakes. However, the ability to predict its spatial and seasonal variation is constrained by the lack of a thermal classification system. Here we define lake thermal regions using objective analysis of seasonal surface temperature dynamics from satellite observations. Nine lake thermal regions are identified that mapped robustly and largely contiguously globally, even for small lakes. The regions differed from other global patterns, and so provide unique information. Using a lake model forced by 21st century climate projections, we found that 12%, 27% and 66% of lakes will change to a lower latitude thermal region by 2080–2099 for low, medium and high greenhouse gas concentration trajectories (Representative Concentration Pathways 2.6, 6.0 and 8.5) respectively. Under the worst-case scenario, a 79% reduction in the number of lakes in the northernmost thermal region is projected. This thermal region framework can facilitate the global scaling of lake-research.

• Item Type: Articles
• Additional Information: The work was supported by GloboLakes funded by the Natural Environment Research Council (grant number NE/J021717/ 1). RIW received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement No. 79181 and the H2020 project EUSTACE (grant number 640171). Generation of the ARC-lake dataset was funded by the European Space Agency (contract 22184/09/I-OL).
• Status: Published
• Refereed: Yes
• Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID: Gong, Miss Mengyi and O'Donnell, Dr Ruth and Miller, Professor Claire and Scott, Professor Marian
• Authors: Maberly, S. C., O'Donnell, R. A., Woolway, R. I., Cutler, M. E.J., Gong, M., Jones, I. D., Merchant, C. J., Miller, C. A., Politi, E., Scott, E. M., Thackeray, S. J., and Tyler, A. N.
• College/School: College of Science and Engineering > School of Mathematics and Statistics
• Journal Name: Nature Communications
• Publisher: Nature Research
• ISSN: 2041-1723
• ISSN (Online): 2041-1723
• Copyright Holders: Copyright © 2020 The Authors
• First Published: First published in Nature Communications 11: 1232
• Publisher Policy: Reproduced under a Creative Commons License