Science Sources: Detection and Attribution

Climate Signals tracks detection and attribution studies in real time. Below is an updating database of studies that find the fingerprint of human-caused climate change on observed trends and events. The database is limited to studies of local significance in the United States and studies of global significance. For a broader database of peer-reviewed studies and organizational reports on climate change trends, please see all Science Sources.

Search or browse our collection of detection and attribution studies below, or learn more about detection and attribution studies.

Title Source Date Author(s)
Seasonal Climate Variability and Change in the Pacific Northwest of the United States American Meteorological Society John T. Abatzoglou, David E. Rupp and Philip W. Mote
Severe Continental-Scale Impacts of Climate Change Are Happening Now: Extreme Climate Events Impact Marine Habitat Forming Communities Along 45% of Australia’s Coast Frontiers in Marine Science Babcock, Russell C., Bustamante, Rodrigo H., Fulton, Elizabeth A., Fulton, Derek J., Haywood, Michael D. E., Hobday, Alistair James, Kenyon, Robert, Matear, Richard James, Plagányi, Eva E., Richardson, Anthony J., Vanderklift, Mathew A.
Signal detectability in extreme precipitation changes assessed from twentieth century climate simulations Climate Dynamics Seung-Ki Min, Xuebin Zhang, Francis W. Zwiers, Petra Friederichs, Andreas Hense
Significant anthropogenic-induced changes of climate classes since 1950 Nature Duo Chan, Qigang Wu
Simulations of Hurricane Katrina (2005) under sea level and climate conditions for 1900 Climatic Change Jennifer L. Irish, Alison Sleath, Mary A. Cialone, Thomas R. Knutson, Robert E. Jensen
Single‐step attribution of increasing frequencies of very warm regional temperatures to human influence Atmospheric Science Letters Peter A. Stott, Gareth S. Jones, Nikolaos Christidis, Francis W. Zwiers, Gabriele Hegerl, Hideo Shiogama
Southern Ocean warming due to human influence Geophysical Research Letters John C. Fyfe
Structure and Detectability of Trends in Hydrological Measures over the Western United States Journal of Hydrometeorology T. Das, H. G. Hidalgo, M. D. Dettinger, D. R. Cayan, D. W. Pierce, C. Bonfils, T. P. Barnett, G. Bala and A. Mirin
Synoptic and Climate Attributions of the December 2015 Extreme Flooding in Missouri, USA Water Boniface Fosu, Simon Wang, and Kathleen Pegion
Synoptic and quantitative attributions of the extreme precipitation leading to the August 2016 Louisiana flood Geophysical Research Letters S.‐Y. Simon Wang, Lin Zhao, Robert R. Gillies
Temperature impacts on the water year 2014 drought in California Geophysical Research Letters Shraddhanand Shukla, Mohammad Safeeq, Amir AghaKouchak, Kaiyu Guan, Chris Funk
Temperature-driven global sea-level variability in the Common Era Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Robert E. Kopp, Andrew C. Kemp, Klaus Bittermann, Benjamin P. Horton, Jeffrey P. Donnelly, W. Roland Gehrels, Carling C. Hay, Jerry X. Mitrovica, Eric D. Morrow, Stefan Rahmstorf
The 2016 Southeastern U.S. Drought: An Extreme Departure From Centennial Wetting and Cooling Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres A. Park Williams, Benjamin I. Cook, Jason E. Smerdon, Daniel A. Bishop, Richard Seager, Justin S. Mankin
The contribution of anthropogenic forcings to regional changes in temperature during the last decade Climate Dynamics Nikolaos Christidis, Peter A. Stott, Francis W. Zwiers, Hideo Shiogama, Toru Nozawa
The economic costs of Hurricane Harvey attributable to climate change Climatic Change David J. Frame, Michael F. Wehner, Ilan Noy, Suzanne M. Rosier
The human influence on Hurricane Florence Stony Brook University’s School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences Kevin Reed, Alyssa Stansfield, Michael Wehner, and Colin Zarzycki
The Role of Human Activity in the Recent Warming of Extremely Warm Daytime Temperatures AMS Journal of Climate Nikolaos Christidis, Peter A. Stott, and Simon J. Brown
The Roles of Climate Change and Climate Variability in the 2017 Atlantic Hurricane Season Scientific Reports Young-Kwon Lim, Siegfried D. Schubert, Robin Kovach, Andrea M. Molod, Steven Pawson
The twenty‐first century Colorado River hot drought and implications for the future Water Resources Research Bradley Udall, Jonathan Overpeck
Toward Regional-Scale Climate Change Detection AMS Journal of Climate Francis W. Zwiers and Xuebin Zhang