TY - JOUR T1 - The tropical lapse rate steepened during the Last Glacial Maximum JF - Science Advances Y1 - 2017 A1 - Loomis, Shannon E. A1 - Russell, James M. A1 - Verschuren, Dirk A1 - Morrill, Carrie A1 - De Cort, Gijs A1 - Sinninghe Damsté, Jaap S. A1 - Olago, Daniel A1 - Eggermont, Hilde A1 - Street-Perrott, F. Alayne A1 - Kelly, Meredith A. AB - The gradient of air temperature with elevation (the temperature lapse rate) in the tropics is predicted to become less steep during the coming century as surface temperature rises, enhancing the threat of warming in high-mountain environments. However, the sensitivity of the lapse rate to climate change is uncertain because of poor constraints on high-elevation temperature during past climate states. We present a 25,000-year temperature reconstruction from Mount Kenya, East Africa, which demonstrates that cooling during the Last Glacial Maximum was amplified with elevation and hence that the lapse rate was significantly steeper than today. Comparison of our data with paleoclimate simulations indicates that state-of-the-art models underestimate this lapse-rate change. Consequently, future high-elevation tropical warming may be even greater than predicted. VL - 3 UR - https://advances.sciencemag.org/lookup/doi/10.1126/sciadv.1600815 IS - 1 ER -