Character of climate instability during warm periods: Investigations from Central Italy

In light of the unprecedented nature of anthropogenically-induced warming, quantitative
palaeoclimate reconstructions of past interglacials offer a valuable insight into natural
background conditions during periods of excess warmth. A prominent example is the Last
Interglacial (129-116 thousand years ago), characterised by global mean temperature 1deg C
above pre-industrial values, intense Arctic warming and global sea-level ~6-9 m above
present.
Despite being previously considered as relatively stable, recent research has revealed a
series of high-frequency climate oscillations of greater intensity than during the Holocene (last
11.7 thousand years) punctuating the Last Interglacial in the North Atlantic and southern
Europe (Tzedakis et al., 2018). This has raised a series of questions regarding the
geographical extent and intensity of abrupt events, as well as whether intervals warmer than
present are inherently more climatically unstable.
A lack of precise, independent and robust chronological control has been the primary
constraint limiting the identification of high-frequency climate variability within earlier
interglacials. Applying a chronology using dated volcanic ash (tephra) layers, this project aims
to employ pollen analysis to reconstruct terrestrial vegetation and assess the extent of climate
instability during the Last Interglacial at Fucino Basin, Central Italy, compared to the Holocene.