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Ice-rich permafrost in the circum-Arctic and sub-Arctic (hereafter pan-Arctic), such as late Pleistocene Yedoma, are especially prone to degradation due to climate change or human activity. When Yedoma deposits thaw, large amounts of frozen organic matter and biogeochemically relevant elements return into current biogeochemical cycles. This mobilization of elements has local and global implications: increased thaw in thermokarst or thermal erosion settings enhances greenhouse gas fluxes from permafrost regions. In addition, this ice-rich ground is of special concern for infrastructure stability as the terrain surface settles along with thawing. Finally, understanding the distribution of the Yedoma domain area provides a window into the Pleistocene past and allows reconstruction of Ice Age environmental conditions and past mammoth-steppe landscapes. Therefore, a detailed assessment of the current pan-Arctic Yedoma coverage is of importance to estimate its potential contribution to permafrost-climate feedbacks, assess infrastructure vulnerabilities, and understand past environmental and permafrost dynamics. Building on previous mapping efforts, the objective of this paper is to compile the first digital pan-Arctic Yedoma map and spatial database of Yedoma coverage. Therefore, we 1) synthesized, analyzed, and digitized geological and stratigraphical maps allowing identification of Yedoma occurrence at all available scales, and 2) compiled field data and expert knowledge for creating Yedoma map confidence classes. We used GIS-techniques to vectorize maps and harmonize site information based on expert knowledge. We included a range of attributes for Yedoma areas based on lithological and stratigraphic information from the source maps and assigned three different confidence levels of the presence of Yedoma (confirmed, likely, or uncertain). Using a spatial buffer of 20 km around mapped Yedoma occurrences, we derived an extent of the Yedoma domain. Our result is a vector-b

Pollen records from Siberia are mostly absent in global or Northern Hemisphere synthesis works. Here we present a taxonomically harmonized and temporally standardized pollen dataset that was synthesized using 173 palynological records from Siberia and adjacent areas (northeastern Asia, 42–75∘ N, 50–180∘ E). Pollen data were taxonomically harmonized, i.e. the original 437 taxa were assigned to 106 combined pollen taxa. Age–depth models for all records were revised by applying a constant Bayesian age–depth modelling routine. The pollen dataset is available as count data and percentage data in a table format (taxa vs. samples), with age information for each sample. The dataset has relatively few sites covering the last glacial period between 40 and 11.5 ka (calibrated thousands of years before 1950 CE) particularly from the central and western part of the study area. In the Holocene period, the dataset has many sites from most of the area, with the exception of the central part of Siberia. Of the 173 pollen records, 81 % of pollen counts were downloaded from open databases (GPD, EPD, PANGAEA) and 10 % were contributions by the original data gatherers, while a few were digitized from publications. Most of the pollen records originate from peatlands (48 %) and lake sediments (33 %). Most of the records (83 %) have ≥3 dates, allowing the establishment of reliable chronologies. The dataset can be used for various purposes, including pollen data mapping (example maps for Larix at selected time slices are shown) as well as quantitative climate and vegetation reconstructions. The datasets for pollen counts and pollen percentages are available at https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.898616 (Cao et al., 2019a), also including the site information, data source, original publication, dating data, and the plant functional type for each pollen taxa.

A continuous pollen record from Lake El'gygytgyn (northeastern Russian Arctic) provides detailed information concerning the regional vegetation and climate history during the Mid-Pleistocene Transition (MPT), between 1091 ka (end of Marine Isotope Stage (MIS) 32) and 715 ka (end of MIS 18). Pollen-based qualitative vegetation reconstruction along with biome reconstruction indicate that the interglacial regional vegetation history during the MPT is characterized by a gradual replacement of forest and shrub vegetation by open herbaceous communities (i.e. tundra/cold steppe). The pollen spectra reveal seven vegetation successions that have clearly distinguishable glacial-interglacial cycles. These successions are represented by the intervals of cold deciduous forest (CLDE) biome scores changing from high to low, which are basically in phase with the variations of obliquity from maxima to minima. The dominating influence of obliquity forcing on vegetation successions contradicts with the stronger power of eccentricity, as demonstrated by the result of wavelet analysis based on landscape openness reconstruction. This discrepancy shows that a single index is insufficient for catching signals of all the impacting factors. Comparisons with vegetation and environmental changes in the Asian interior suggest that global cooling during the MPT was probably the key force driving long-term aridification in the Arctic region. The accelerated aridification after MIS 24-22 was probably caused by the additional effect of the Tibetan Plateau uplift, which played an important role on intensification of the Siberian High and westerly jet systems.

A continuous pollen record from Lake El'gygytgyn (northeastern Russian Arctic) provides detailed information concerning the regional vegetation and climate history during the Mid-Pleistocene Transition (MPT), between 1091 ka (end of Marine Isotope Stage (MIS) 32) and 715 ka (end of MIS 18). Pollen-based qualitative vegetation reconstruction along with biome reconstruction indicate that the interglacial regional vegetation history during the MPT is characterized by a gradual replacement of forest and shrub vegetation by open herbaceous communities (i.e. tundra/cold steppe). The pollen spectra reveal seven vegetation successions that have clearly distinguishable glacial-interglacial cycles. These successions are represented by the intervals of cold deciduous forest (CLDE) biome scores changing from high to low, which are basically in phase with the variations of obliquity from maxima to minima. The dominating influence of obliquity forcing on vegetation successions contradicts with the stronger power of eccentricity, as demonstrated by the result of wavelet analysis based on landscape openness reconstruction. This discrepancy shows that a single index is insufficient for catching signals of all the impacting factors. Comparisons with vegetation and environmental changes in the Asian interior suggest that global cooling during the MPT was probably the key force driving long-term aridification in the Arctic region. The accelerated aridification after MIS 24-22 was probably caused by the additional effect of the Tibetan Plateau uplift, which played an important role on intensification of the Siberian High and westerly jet systems.

Recent global warming is pronounced in high-latitude regions (e.g. northern Asia), and will cause the vegetation to change. Future vegetation trends (e.g. the “arctic greening”) will feed back into atmospheric circulation and the global climate system. Understanding the nature and causes of past vegetation changes is important for predicting the composition and distribution of future vegetation communities. Fossil pollen records from 468 sites in northern and eastern Asia were biomised at selected times between 40 cal ka bp and today. Biomes were also simulated using a climate-driven biome model and results from the two approaches compared in order to help understand the mechanisms behind the observed vegetation changes. The consistent biome results inferred by both approaches reveal that long-term and broad-scale vegetation patterns reflect global to hemispheric-scale climate changes. Forest biomes increase around the beginning of the late deglaciation, become more widespread during the early and middle Holocene, and decrease in the late Holocene in fringe areas of the Asian Summer Monsoon. At the southern and southwestern margins of the taiga, forest increases in the early Holocene and shows notable species succession, which may have been caused by winter warming at ca. 7 cal ka bp. At the northeastern taiga margin (central Yakutia and northeastern Siberia), shrub expansion during the last deglaciation appears to prevent the permafrost from thawing and hinders the northward expansion of evergreen needle-leaved species until ca. 7 cal ka bp. The vegetation climate disequilibrium during the early Holocene in the taiga-tundra transition zone suggests that projected climate warming will not cause a northward expansion of evergreen needle-leaved species.

Vast portions of Arctic and sub-Arctic Siberia, Alaska and the Yukon Territory are covered by ice-rich silty to sandy deposits that are containing large ice wedges, resulting from syngenetic sedimentation and freezing. Accompanied by wedge-ice growth in polygonal landscapes, the sedimentation process was driven by cold continental climatic and environmental conditions in unglaciated regions during the late Pleistocene, inducing the accumulation of the unique Yedoma deposits up to >50 meters thick. Because of fast incorporation of organic material into syngenetic permafrost during its formation, Yedoma deposits include well-preserved organic matter. Ice-rich deposits like Yedoma are especially prone to degradation triggered by climate changes or human activity. When Yedoma deposits degrade, large amounts of sequestered organic carbon as well as other nutrients are released and become part of active biogeochemical cycling. This could be of global significance for future climate warming as increased permafrost thaw is likely to lead to a positive feedback through enhanced greenhouse gas fluxes. Therefore, a detailed assessment of the current Yedoma deposit coverage and its volume is of importance to estimate its potential response to future climate changes. We synthesized the map of the coverage (see figure) and thickness estimation, which will provide critical data needed for further research. In particular, this preliminary Yedoma map is a great step forward to understand the spatial heterogeneity of Yedoma deposits and its regional coverage. There will be further applications in the context of reconstructing paleo-environmental dynamics and past ecosystems like the mammoth-steppe-tundra, or ground ice distribution including future thermokarst vulnerability. Moreover, the map will be a crucial improvement of the data basis needed to refine the present-day Yedoma permafrost organic carbon inventory, which is assumed to be between 83±12 (Strauss et al., 2013) and 129±3