Question

Answer each of the following questions in separate paragraphs. Be brief and to the point.

1. What are Milankovic cycles? (1 point)

2. List three astrophysical reasons that give rise to periodic climatic variations on Earth. (1.5 points)

3. What evidence do we have for past Milankovic cycle based climate change on Earth?

Answer 1

1) A Milankovitch cycle is a cyclical movement related to the Earth’s orbit around the Sun. There are three of them: eccentricity, axial tilt, and precession. According to the Milankovitch Theory, these three cycles combine to affect the amount of solar heat that’s incident on the Earth’s surface and subsequently influence climatic patterns.

2 + 3)The first of the three Milankovitch Cycles is the Earth's eccentricity. Eccentricity is, simply, the shape of the Earth's orbit around the Sun. This constantly fluctuating, orbital shape ranges between more and less elliptical (0 to 5% ellipticity) on a cycle of about 100,000 years. These oscillations, from more elliptic to less elliptic, are of prime importance to glaciation in that it alters the distance from the Earth to the Sun, thus changing the distance the Sun's short wave radiation must travel to reach Earth, subsequently reducing or increasing the amount of radiation received at the Earth's surface in different seasons.

Axial tilt, the second of the three Milankovitch Cycles, is the inclination of the Earth's axis in relation to its plane of orbit around the Sun. Oscillations in the degree of Earth's axial tilt occur on a periodicity of 41,000 years from 21.5 to 24.5 degrees.

Precession

Aside from the tilt, the axis also wobbles like a top. A complete wobble cycle is more or less 26,000 years. This motion is caused by tidal forces from the Sun and Moon. Precession as well as tilting are the reasons why regions near and at the poles experience very long nights and very long days at certain times of the year