Archaeologist of dendrochronology at USC´s Campus Terra, Marta Domínguez, connects in a study Caribbean hurricanes with solar radiation

Historic registries from Spanish shipwrecks in the Caribbean combined with sequences of pine tree growth in the Florida Keys indicates that between 1645 and 1715, a period also known as the Maunder Minimum, there were the least number of hurricanes (or tropical cyclones) in the Caribbean since the year 1495. This new research is led by the University of Arizona along with co-author Marta Domínguez Delmás, the Marie Curie researcher in the Botanical Science department at USC´s Higher Polytechnic School in Lugo. 

 

This research pioneers the use of shipwreck history in order to reconstruct the tropical cyclones´ activities. In addition to Marta Domínguez Delmás, Valerie Trouet and Grant L. Harley contributed to the article ¨Shipwreck Rates Reveal Caribbean Tropical Cyclone Response to Past Radiative Forcing¨ published in the prestigious scientific journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), which is the official publication of the National Academy of Science of the United States.

 

The mentioned article indicates that the research investigators found a reduction of 75% of the number of hurricanes in the Caribbean during the Maunder Minimum, a well documented period of decrease in solar spots and was characterized by the low temperatures in the Northern hemisphere.