A New Climate Response Model for the Orbital Tuning of Pleistocene Climate Reconstructions

Abstract

This paper describes a new approach to orbital tuning for the adjustment of proxy-based paleoclimate chronologies; the approach involves the synchronization of reconstructed paleotemperatures with quasi-temperature series derived from data on changes in insolation at the top of the atmosphere. The time lag between insolation and induced temperature reaction is estimated using a physical model describing the relationship between changes in the ground surface heat flux and ground surface temperature. The resulting time-lag estimates are in good agreement with the results of empirical analysis of independent age markers.