A 2000 year-long proxy and observational reconstruction of Central Asian climate

Central Asia (CA) is one of the most arid places on Earth and climate change threatens to disrupt the natural hydrologic systems that store its limited annual wet-season precipitation in glaciers and release it during the dry season. Warm/Wet and Cold/Dry periods recorded over the last 2000 years using multiple paleoclimate proxy records reflect a local hydrocycle dominated by the Westerlies and moisture recycling within the Aral Sea catchment.