Northwest Himalaya 576 Year Standardized Precipitation Index Reconstruction Yadav, R.R.; Gupta, A.K.; Kotlia, B.S.; Singh, V.; Misra, K.G.; Yadava, A.K.; Singh, A.K. Yadav, R.R. Gupta, A.K. Kotlia, B.S. Singh, V. Misra, K.G. Yadava, A.K. Singh, A.K. Precipitation Reconstruction earth science/paleoclimate/climate reconstructions|tree ring (age,null,null,year Common Era,null,climate reconstructions|tree ring,null,null,N,null) earth science/paleoclimate/climate reconstructions|tree ring (standardized precipitation index,ring width,null,dimensionless,Apr-May,climate reconstructions|tree ring,null,null,N,null) earth science/paleoclimate/reconstructions (Northwest Himalaya>LATITUDE >LONGITUDE ) Hydroclimatic variability driven by global warming in the climatically vulnerable cold semi-arid to arid northwest (NW) Himalaya is poorly constrained due to paucity of continuous weather records and annually resolved proxies. Applying a network of annually resolved tree-ring-width chronologies from semi-arid region of Kishtwar, Jammu and Kashmir, India, we reconstructed April-May standardized precipitation index extending back to A.D. 1439 (576 years). The reconstructed series is featured by the most conspicuous long-term droughts during the 15th to early 17th centuries followed by a general wetting, with 1984-2014 being the wettest interval in the past 576 years. The data, consistent with other independently developed tree-ring-based hydrological records from cold semi-arid to arid NW Himalaya and Karakoram, point to an increased regional wetting in the recent decades. Such an increased wetting might have led to the anomalous behaviour of glaciers in the NW Himalaya and Karakoram in contrast to the general receding trends in the central and eastern Himalaya. STUDY NOTES: Standardized precipitation index reconstruction for April/May, 1439-2014 CE, based on 5 NW Himalaya tree-ring chronologies. NCDC-Paleoclimatology https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/data-access/paleoclimatology-data - Bauer Bruce Investigator : Yadav, R.R. Investigator : Gupta, A.K. Investigator : Kotlia, B.S. Investigator : Singh, V. Investigator : Misra, K.G. Investigator : Yadava, A.K. Investigator : Singh, A.K. 2017-08-21 ONLINE Files online, ASCII https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/paleo/study/22546 https://www1.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/paleo/treering/reconstructions/asia/himalaya2017spi.txt https://www1.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/paleo/treering/reconstructions/asia/himalaya2017spi.txt English https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/paleo/study/22546 https://www1.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/paleo/treering/reconstructions/asia/himalaya2017spi.txt Ram R. Yadav, Anil K. Gupta, Bahadur S. Kotlia, Vikram Singh, Krishna G. Misra, Akhilesh K. Yadava, Anoop K. Singh2017Recent Wetting and Glacier Expansion in the Northwest Himalaya and KarakoramScientific Reports6139710.1038/s41598-017-06388-5https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-017-06388-5 START YEAR: 1439 AD * END YEAR: 2014 AD 74 33 76.5 34.5