Simulating the mid-Holocene in PMIP

The midHolocene experiment has been a target period for PMIP activity since the beginning.It has gone through four different iterations in the past 30 years.Over 60 models, of various levels of complexity and resolution, have been used for the midHolocene experiment-contributed from around 20 different modeling groups.They all capture a similar large-scale response, but with a level of detail and understanding that increases with every PMIP phase.Experimental design before describing the design, it is probably worth explaining why the mid-Holocene was chosen as a target period.The ideal period to simulate is one that has a large forced climate change (so a high signalto-noise ratio), as well as plentiful accurate paleoclimate reconstructions with which to compare the model results.reconstructions suggest that 6,000 years ago, the tail-end of the African Humid Period, was the warmest portion of the Holocene (COHMAP Members 1988).Yet subsequent transient simulations do not show a warming peak: a "Holocene conundrum" that is not fully resolved (bader et al. 2020).A different time period might have been chosen today, but the wealth of research focused around 6,000 kyr bP since this period was selected by PMIP means there is little point in deviating now.