PAGES - Past Global Changes

Welcome to PAGES

The PAGES (Past Global Changes) project is an international effort to coordinate and promote past global change research. The primary objective is to improve our understanding of past changes in the Earth system in order to improve projections of future climate and environment, and inform strategies for sustainability. ... more

PAGES is open and inclusive to all scientists interested in past global changes. In February 2017, PAGES' parent organization Future Earth published a statement affirming its commitment to supporting international collaboration and the free movement of scientists and flow of data, information and knowledge for global sustainability. PAGES fully supports the Future Earth statement.

PAGES is funded by the US National Science Foundation and the Swiss Academy of Sciences, and supported in-kind by the University of Bern, Switzerland. It is a Global Research Project of Future Earth and a scientific partner of WCRP.

Read the latest e-news

Details: Published: Wednesday, 15 August 2018 17:50

Read about the latest PAGES' news, meetings and opportunities from around the world in this month's e-news.

Highlights include the last call for feedback (by 31 August) on the future of the printed Past Global Changes Magazine, a request to check your details are correct on the People Database, 4 October deadline for new working group proposals, PAGES' working group and ECN updates and meeting announcements, and news from Future Earth and WCRP.

Are your details up to date?

Details: Published: Monday, 13 August 2018 16:20

movehouse Are you a member of the PAGES' People Database on our website?

Have you recently moved, started a new job or switched university? We encourage you to check and/or update your details to continue receiving communications, including our short monthly e-news and Past Global Changes Magazine, and to let the wider paleo community know what you're up to.

Click here to update your account or here to join as a new member.

Call for new working groups

Details: Published: Monday, 13 August 2018 12:23

Does your heart pound for paleoscience? Know others who feel the same?

Propose a new PAGES' working group to address a scientific question in an internationally coordinated way. The application deadline is Thursday 4 October 2018 at 17:00 UTC.

You must contact a member of the PAGES Scientific Steering Committee to discuss your plans at least two weeks before you submit the proposal. Applications received without SSC member notification will not be looked upon favorably.

Paper questions fluctuation

Details: Published: Wednesday, 08 August 2018 16:27

A new paper from PAGES' PALSEA working group questions the occurrence of a rapid sea-level fluctuation within the Last Interglacial.

Authors, led by the group's next phase co-leader Natasha Barlow, synthesize published geomorphological and stratigraphic indicators from the Last Interglacial, and find no evidence for ice-sheet regrowth within the warm interglacial climate.

They also identify uncertainties in the interpretation of local relative sea-level data that underpin the reconstructions of global mean sea level.

Read the Nature Geoscience paper, titled "Lack of evidence for a substantial sea-level fluctuation within the Last Interglacial" here.

Find out more about the PALSEA working group here.

GPWG2 QI special issue

Details: Published: Monday, 30 July 2018 16:32

PAGES' Global Paleofire Working Group 2 (GPWG2) recently released a Special Issue of Quaternary International, titled "The Fire-Human-Climate-Vegetation Nexus".

The group presents nine original manuscripts focusing on paleofire studies that contribute to our understanding of natural and anthropogenic causes of fire through time. It is global in scope, with manuscripts that explore local-to-regional fire histories from five continents: Africa (Kenya), Asia (China), Europe (Romania and Ireland), Southern America (Bolivia) and Northern America (western Canada and the US Rocky Mountains).

Access the special issue, edited by Boris Vannière and Mitchell Power, here.

Guest advances data needs

Details: Published: Monday, 30 July 2018 15:08

PAGES' Scientific Steering Committee (SSC) member Darrell Kaufman has a date with all things data during his six-month sabbatical in Bern, Switzerland.

Normally you will find PAGES' current guest scientist analyzing lake sediment cores from Alaska, as Regents' Professor at the School of Earth and Sustainability, Northern Arizona University, USA. But a data scare and joining the SSC in 2015 have helped shape the current phase of his career.