C
Colin Summerhayes
Researcher at Scott Polar Research Institute
Publications - 104
Citations - 8811
Colin Summerhayes is an academic researcher from Scott Polar Research Institute. The author has contributed to research in topics: Anthropocene & Climate change. The author has an hindex of 32, co-authored 99 publications receiving 7156 citations. Previous affiliations of Colin Summerhayes include University of Cambridge & Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research.
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Journal ArticleDOI
Trajectories of the Earth System in the Anthropocene.
Will Steffen,Johan Rockström,Katherine Richardson,Timothy M. Lenton,Carl Folke,Carl Folke,Diana Liverman,Colin Summerhayes,Anthony D. Barnosky,Sarah Cornell,Michel Crucifix,Jonathan F. Donges,Jonathan F. Donges,Ingo Fetzer,Steven J. Lade,Steven J. Lade,Marten Scheffer,Ricarda Winkelmann,Hans Joachim Schellnhuber,Hans Joachim Schellnhuber,Hans Joachim Schellnhuber +20 more
TL;DR: The risk that self-reinforcing feedbacks could push the Earth System toward a planetary threshold that, if crossed, could prevent stabilization of the climate at intermediate temperature rises and cause continued warming on a “Hothouse Earth” pathway even as human emissions are reduced is explored.
Journal ArticleDOI
The Anthropocene is functionally and stratigraphically distinct from the Holocene
Colin N. Waters,Jan Zalasiewicz,Colin Summerhayes,Anthony D. Barnosky,Clément Poirier,Agnieszka Gałuszka,Alejandro Cearreta,Matt Edgeworth,Erle C. Ellis,Michael A. Ellis,Catherine Jeandel,Reinhold Leinfelder,John Robert McNeill,Daniel Richter,Will Steffen,James P. M. Syvitski,Davor Vidas,Michael Wagreich,Mark Williams,An Zhisheng,Jacques Grinevald,Eric O. Odada,Naomi Oreskes,Alexander P. Wolfe +23 more
TL;DR: C climatic, biological, and geochemical signatures of human activity in sediments and ice cores, Combined with deposits of new materials and radionuclides, as well as human-caused modification of sedimentary processes, the Anthropocene stands alone stratigraphically as a new epoch beginning sometime in the mid–20th century.
Journal ArticleDOI
Antarctic climate change and the environment
Peter Convey,Robert Bindschadler,G. di Prisco,Eberhard Fahrbach,Julian Gutt,Dominic A. Hodgson,Paul Andrew Mayewski,Colin Summerhayes,John Turner +8 more
TL;DR: The Southern Hemisphere climate system varies on timescales from orbital, through millennial to sub-annual, and is closely coupled to other parts of the global climate system as discussed by the authors.
Journal ArticleDOI
The geological cycle of plastics and their use as a stratigraphic indicator of the Anthropocene
Jan Zalasiewicz,Colin N. Waters,Juliana A. Ivar do Sul,Patricia L. Corcoran,Anthony D. Barnosky,Alejandro Cearreta,Matt Edgeworth,Agnieszka Gałuszka,Catherine Jeandel,Reinhold Leinfelder,John Robert McNeill,Will Steffen,Colin Summerhayes,Michael Wagreich,Mark Williams,Alexander P. Wolfe,Yasmin Yonan +16 more
TL;DR: In a recent study, this paper found that plastic particles are abundant and widespread in marine sedimentary deposits in both shallow and deep-water settings, and their distribution in both the terrestrial and marine realms suggests that they are a key geological indicator of the Anthropocene, as a distinctive stratal component.
Journal ArticleDOI
When did the Anthropocene begin? A mid-twentieth century boundary level is stratigraphically optimal
Jan Zalasiewicz,Colin N. Waters,Mark Williams,Anthony D. Barnosky,Alejandro Cearreta,Paul J. Crutzen,Erle C. Ellis,Michael A. Ellis,Ian J. Fairchild,Jacques Grinevald,Peter K. Haff,Irka Hajdas,Reinhold Leinfelder,John Robert McNeill,Eric O. Odada,Clément Poirier,Daniel Richter,Will Steffen,Colin Summerhayes,James P. M. Syvitski,Davor Vidas,Michael Wagreich,Scott L. Wing,Alexander P. Wolfe,Zhisheng An,Naomi Oreskes +25 more
TL;DR: In this article, the boundary of the Anthropocene geological time interval as an epoch is defined as the time of the first nuclear bomb explosion, on July 16th 1945 at Alamogordo, New Mexico; additional bombs were detonated at the average rate of one every 9.6 days until 1988 with attendant worldwide fallout easily identifiable in the chemostratigraphic record.