late holocene high resolution glacial chronologies and climate kenai mountains alaska recent retreat of outlet glaciers from the harding and grewingk yalik icefields has revealed a vast array of deposits on the eastern and western flanks of the kenai mountains that records multiple glacier advances into coastal forests during late holocene time treering dating together with radiocarbon and lichenometric analyses allows for the reconstruction of these glacial fluctuations to decadal precision over the past two thousand years the records of fluctuations are derived from 16 land terminating and seven tidewater glaciers in three fjord systems as well as two cirque glaciers three major intervals of holocene glacier expansions are evident they occurred about 3600 yr b p 600 a d and during the little ice age from 1300 to 1850 a d the earliest expansion beyond present ice margins is known only from the mccarty tidewater glacier the 600 a d event involved the simultaneous advance of land terminating and tidewater glaciers during the little ice age however tidewater glaciers were advancing several centuries prior to their land terminating neighbors those land terminating glaciers on the western mountain flank retreated from their little ice age maxima as much as two centuries before those on the eastern mountain flank land terminating tongues on the eastern more maritime mountain flank have shown more sensitivity to variations in winter precipitation during the little ice age and within recent decades than the more continental glaciers on the western flank that are affected more by summer temperatures the glacial and climatic records suggest that advances of the ice tongues from about 1420 to 1460 a d between 1640 and 1670 a d at about 1750 a d and from 1880 to 1910 a d reflected times of increased winter precipitation advances between 1440 to 1460 a d from 1650 to 1710 a d and from 1830 to 1860 a d followed intervals of lower summer temperatures

tree ring evidence of little ice age glacier advances in southern tibet the history of late holocene glacier fluctuations in eastern tibet was studied by determining the ages of trees growing on glacier deposits maximum tree ages yield minimum ages of ad 1760 and 1780 for moraine formation at the maximum extent of the little ice age glacier advances in two glacier forefields subsequent moraines could be dated to the beginning of the nineteenth and the beginning of the twentieth century larch trees from a third glacier forefield in southeastern tibet show evidence of glacier activity from 1580 to 1590 from the end of the eighteenth to the beginning of the nineteenth century and from 1860 to 1880 one glacier at mt gyalaperi recently advanced in both 1951 and 1987 periods of glacier advances can partly be correlated with periods of growth reductions in chronologies of total ring width and maximum latewood density derived from trees growing on slopes above the glacier valleys correlation functions with meteorological data suggest that maximum latewood density of subalpin

reconstruction of the late quaternary glaciation of the macha khola valley gorkha himal nepal using relative and absolute 14c 10be dendrochronology dating techniques abstract late quaternary glacier fluctuations in the macha khola valley gorkha himal nepal were reconstructed using relative and absolute dating techniques our results indicate that younger moraine complexes were left by late holocene

spatial and temporal patterns of variations in tree growth over the northeastern tibetan plateau during the period ad 1450 2001 we analyzed spatial and temporal growth variations of qilian junipers over the northeastern tibetan plateau tp during the period 1450 2001 by applying the empirical orthogonal function eof technique to seven moisture sensitive tree ring width chronologies the first three principal components together explain 78 21 of the total variance the first principal component pc1 accounts for 51 58 of the total variance and represents consistent tree growth variations in the northeastern tp the second eof mode reveals an opposite structure for the southern and northern parts of the northeastern tibetan plateau reflecting the effect of huge topography and associated atmospheric circulation on tree growth anomalies the third eof mode represents an opposite structure for the eastern and western parts of the northeastern tibetan plateau possibly indicating the influence of different branches of atmospheric circulation system in this area the eof analysis results of instrumental precipitation data resembl

glacier fluctuation and tree ring records for the last millennium in the canadian rockies tree ring series and records of alpine glacier fluctuations provide complementary evidence to reconstruct decade to century climate fluctuations over the last millennium in the canadian rockies tree line ring width chronologies in this area are temperature sensitive and long ca 900 years series from sites adjacent to bennington and athabasca glaciers show synchronous declines in ring width during the periods ca 1170 1180 1280 1290 1330 1350 1430 1450 1530 1540 1690 1705 and 1810 1825 a d the latter two events are replicated in many shorter tree ring chronologies and immediately precede the two major periods of moraine development ca 1700 1725 and 1825 1875 a d during the little ice age dendrochronological dating of glacially overridden trees 0 5 1 0 km upvalley of 18th century maximum positions indicate that robson and peyto glaciers were advancing between 1150 and 1350 a d during the earliest phase of the little ice age in the canadian rockies available tree ring data suggest that the level and pattern of climate variability during the 18th and 19th centuries extends back over the last milennium it is also hypothesised that glaciers attained their maximum holocene extent during the little ice age because of the interaction between these decade to century scale fluctuations and the progressive long term decline of incoming summer solar radiation in the northern hemisphere over the last 10 000 years

the role of the indian summer monsoon and the mid latitude westerlies in himalayan glaciation review and speculative discussion new dates for late quaternary glaciations in the himalayas show that during the last glacial cycle glaciations were not synchronous throughout the region rather in some areas glaciers reached their maxima at the global glacial maximum of c 18 20 ka bp whereas in others glaciers were most extensive at c 60 30 ka bp comparison of these data with palaeoclimatic records from adjacent regions suggest that on millennial timescales himalayan glacier fluctuations are controlled by variations in both the south asian monsoon and the mid latitude westerlies

stable isotope and ostracode species assemblage evidence for lake level changes of nam co southern tibet during the past 600 years abstract ostracode species assemblages and stable oxygen and carbon isotopes of shells from two 210 pb dated short cores of 78 cm and 47 cm length taken from lake nam co southern tibet provide information about lake level history of the past approximately 600 years at decadal resolution a transfer function is applied to reconstruct paleo water depths from modern ostracodes ostracode assemblages and isotope data from five species allow a subdivision into phases of lake level evolution before 1600 ad relatively low oxygen isotope values and high abundances of deep water 30 m ostracodes i e leucocythere dorsotuberosa leucocythere dorsotuberosa f postilirata suggest a lake level 10 m higher than today between 1600 ad and 1800 ad more positive oxygen isotope values and higher abundances of shallow water ostracodes i e ilyocypris cf mongolica candona xizangensis suggest a lake level approximately 40 m below modern level between 1800 ad and 1920 ad oxygen isotopes are characterized by a trend to more negative values followed by a trend to more positive ones these trends are interrupted by several short term fluctuations but overall oxygen isotope values suggest a drop in lake level a clearer lake level picture is provided by species assemblages that suggest a continuously increasing lake level since 1900 ad precipitation data from meteorological stations nearby show an increase in precipitation in the last 30 years the low lake level between 1600 ad and 1800 ad is contemporary to the little ice age during that cold period meltwater input into the lake decreased this underlines the sensitivity of the level of lake nam co to temperature changes on the tibetan plateau

a 1000 year climate ice core record from the guliya ice cap china its relationship to global climate variability in 1992 an american chinese expedition successfully recovered three ice cores 308 6 93 2 and 34 5m from the guliya ice cap summit 6710 m a s l in the far western kunlun on the qinghai tibetan plateau china guliya resembles a polar icecap with 10 m 200 m and basal temperatures of 15 6 5 9 and 2 1 c respectively the 308 6 m core to bedrock is the longest ice core retrieved from an elevation greater than 4000 m a s l and provides the first ice core history from the western side of the qinghai plateau the plateau experiences a pronounced annual precipitation cycle during which 70 80 of annual total precipitation falls in the summer monsoon season this leads to a marked visible stratigraphy in the glaciers which allows accurate dating of the ice cores and reconstruction of the net mass accumulation this paper presents 1 the results of the geophysical program to determine ice thickness ice flow and surface topography 2 an assessment of net accumulation from stake measurements snow pits and shallow core samples and 3 the analyses of the upper 100 m of the 308 6 m core which provide a 1000 year history including the little ice age which is compared with chinese historical records extended periods of positive accumulation on guliya are closely contemporaneous with dry periods in eastern china a trans pacific teleconnection is suggested by the strong temporal coherence between extended wet and dry phases on guliya and on the quelccaya ice cap peru

environmental change during the holocene in western china on a millennial timescale recent data on the evolution of the inland lakes loess palaeosol sequences and glacier variations in western china are briefly reviewed the lake history shows three distinct stages in the holocene i e low water levels before 7500 bp a stage of expansion during the climatic optimum between 7500 and 3500 bp and contraction after 3500 bp three stages wooded grassland mixed woodland wooded grassland becoming steppe also appear indicated by the holocene loess palaeosol sequence in the lanzhou region the optimal period for soil development being between 7500 and 3500 bp there were seven periods of glacier advance the continental glaciers advanced at about 8300 5700 4000 and 400 bp in northwestern china and the maritime glaciers advanced at about 3000 2000 1000 and 200 bp it is suggested that the climatic changes show two periodicities during the holocene namely at intervals of about 2500 and 1000 years

summer temperature reconstruction on the central tibetan plateau during 1860 2002 derived from annually resolved ice core pollen 1 we present a 140 year ice core pollen record with annual time resolution from the puruogangri ice field in the central tibetan plateau a linear regression model between the sum of the steppe and meadow pollen taxa and summer temperature at naqu accounts for 66 of the summer temperature variance for the period 1955 2002 on the basis of this model we reconstructed summer temperature history for the central tibetan plateau from 1860 to 2002 three marked warm periods during the 1870s 1890s and 1990s and five cold periods during the 1860s 1880s 1900s 1950s and 1960 1970s were identified within the last 100 years late 20th century warming is distinctive and may have had a major role in the present retreat of most glaciers on the tibetan plateau the pollen record is also significantly correlated with average annual temperatures over the whole tibetan plateau suggesting that these proxy data have the potential for reflecting large scale regional temperature change the statistically significant similarity between the puruogangri ice core pollen record and the 18o time series indicates that both are reliable indicators of temperature change at annual to multiyear timescales in this region

little ice age glacier fluctuations reconstructed for the southeastern tibetan plateau using tree rings long term records are essential for evaluating recent glacier fluctuation and its linkage to climate change moraines of two glaciers gawalong glacier and xincuo glacier in the southeastern tibetan plateau were dated germination date of the oldest tree yields a minimum age before 1760s for the outermost lateral moraine of gawalong glacier in southern bomi a tilted tree indicated that the glacier readvanced to its maximum position since the early 20th century at around 1987e1992 xincuo glacier in eastern gongbujiangda reached its little ice age lia maximum before 1876 the difference implies that detailed dating of moraines is necessary for studying lia glacier response to climate change in the study area trees growing on lia glacier deposits proved to be very useful for deriving age estimates of historic glacier fluctuations in the southeastern tibetan plateau

systematic variation of summertime tropical cyclone activity in the western north pacific in relation to the madden julian oscillation abstract the variability of observed tropical cyclone tc activity i e genesis track and landfall in the western north pacific wnp is examined in relation to the various categories of the madden julian oscillation mjo during summer june september for the period 1979 2004 the mjo categories are defined based on the empirical orthogonal function analysis of outgoing longwave radiation data the number of tcs increases when the mjo related convection center is located in the wnp the axis of a preferable genesis region systematically shifts like a seesaw in response to changes in the large scale environments associated with both the eastward and northward propagation of the mjo and the intraseasonal variability of the wnp subtropical high furthermore the authors show that the density of tc tracks in each mjo category depends on the systematic shift in the main genesis regions at first order also the shift is affected by the prevailing large scale steering flows in each mjo category when th

glacier variations in the sierra nevada california as related to a 1200 year tree ring chronology abstract a time series of tree ringwidth indices for alpine timberline foxtail pine pinus balfouriana from the sierra nevada of california shows a growth response to summer late fall and early winter temperatures that is the inverse of that resulting in the expansion of alpine glaciers these are correlated with lichen dated moraines and avalanche deposits that accumulated during subsequent decades minima in the ringwidth record reflecting marked temperature declines occurred at 810 1470 1610 1700 and 1810 cold periods of lesser extent are also indicated between 1190 to 1400 and suggest that the initial pulses of the sierran matthes advances may have begun as early as 1190 or 150 yr earlier than previously dated the matthes advances were preceded by a period of pronounced warmth from 900 to 1190 during which timberline rose 10 m to its present elevation a warm period is also indicated between 1500 and 1580 recent work extending the tree ring chronology to 3031 yr b p and radiocarbon dating of weathered samples to 6300 yr b p suggests that the chronology may ultimately be applicable to the dating of earlier sierran glacier advances

nature and timing of quaternary glaciation in the himalayan tibetan orogen abstract much effort has been made in recent years to define the timing and extent of quaternary glaciation throughout the himalayan tibetan orogen these studies are challenging because of the logistical and political inaccessibility of the region and the inherent problems associated with the application of numerical dating techniques nevertheless the studies are providing abundant evidence for significant glacial advances throughout the last several glacial cycles and are beginning to accurately define the extent and timing of glaciation in selected regions studies are showing that himalayan tibetan glaciers in arid regions during the last glacial cycle reached their maximum extent early in the cycle and that global last glacial maximum glacier advances were significantly less extensive however along the more monsoonal influenced greater himalaya there is increasing evidence to suggest that glaciation was more extensive later in the last glacial cycle but this has yet to be fully assessed in addition the new studies are showing that throughout most himalayan tibetan regions significant glacier advances occurred during the lateglacial and early holocene with minor advances in some regions during the mid holocene the still relatively poor chronological control in the himalayan tibetan orogen however makes it difficult to construct correlations across the region and with regions elsewhere in the world this in turn makes it hard to assess the relative importance of the different climatic mechanisms that force glaciation across the himalayan tibetan orogen and to quantify paleoclimate change in this high altitude subtropical region the lateglacial and holocene glacial records however are particularly well preserved in several himalayan tibetan regions glacial successions such as these have the greatest potential to be examined in detail using newly developing numerical dating and geomorphic and sedimentologic methods to derive high resolution terrestrial records of glaciation that will help in paleoclimatic reconstruction for high altitude subtropical regions

tree ring recorded may august temperature variations since a d 1585 in the gaoligong mountains southeastern tibetan plateau abstract high resolution proxy data are still scarce in the southeastern tibetan plateau which limit our understanding of climatic variability before instrumental records in this study we developed 595 year tree ring width chronology from larix speciosa near the timberlines of the gaoligong mountains southeastern tibetan plateau ring width site chronologies and a well replicated regional chronology rc showed significant positive correlations with warm season temperatures from may to august using rc as predictor we reconstructed mean may august temperature for the study region that extends back to a d 1585 cold conditions prevailed during the periods 1600s 1620 30 1640 50s 1700s 1730 40s 1760s 1810 20s 1850s 1900 10s and 1955 70 warm episodes occurred during 1610s 1660 1680s 1710 20s 1750s 1780 90s 1820 40 1920 50 and 1980 present spatial correlations with gridded land surface temperatures revealed that our reconstruction represents regional temperature signal for the southern tibetan plateau comparison with other tree ring based temperature reconstructions from surrounding areas implies a high degree of confidence for our reconstruction

tree ring dated little ice age histories of maritime glaciers from western prince william sound alaska tree ring studies at 13 glacier forefields in western prince william sound show little ice age glacial fluctuations were strongly synchronous on decadal timescales cross dated glacially overrun trees at eight sites indicate ice margins advanced in the early late twelfth through thirteenth centuries and middle seventeenth to early eighteenth centuries little ice age tree ring dates of 22 moraines at 13 glaciers show two main periods of stabilization the earlier of these in the first decades of the eighteenth century overlaps with the second period of glaciers overrunning trees and marks culmination of this middle little ice age expansion stabilization of moraines on nine of the study forefields in the latter part of the nineteenth century delineates a third interval of little ice age glacial advance the detailed little ice age record from land terminating glaciers in western prince william sound is consistent on a timescale of decades with four other tree ring dated glacial histories from across the northern gulf of alaska this coastal northeastern pacific glacial record reveals the structure of the little ice age in the region and provides a strong basis for comparison with other proxy climate records spanning the past 1000 years

late holocene variation of the raigorodskogo glacier and climate change in the pamir alai central asia during the late holocene the raigorodskogo glacier in the pamir alai central asia expanded before 3215 after 1545 and at 310 cal years bp as dated by the 14c calibrated ages of wood samples from moraine deposits and terrace exposures the glacier expansions which were accompanied by increased melt water run off over the terrace surface were confined to the proglacial area the terrace deposits with intercalated buried soil layers provide evidence of two obvious warm periods when the glacier abruptly retreated during the late holocene shortly before 1545 cal years bp and again sometime before ca 500 cal years bp fallen juniperus turkestanica broken by moraine deposits suggests that the largest glacial expansion during the little ice age occurred 310 cal years bp the glacier expansion in the little ice age was on roughly the same scale as that which occurred in the cold period after 1545 cal years bp observational records of the glacier terminus and moraine positions indicate that recent glacier advances occurred in the years 1908 1911 sometime in 1911 1934 and in 1960 1977 these advances were small while the glacier recessions were larger in the 1900s with large recessions also sometime in 1911 1934 and in 1977 1998 the glacier recession rate of 27 m year in 1911 1934 was faster than the rates of 13 m year in 1977 1990 and 21 m year in 1990 1998 however the glacier recession rate has been accelerating recently particularly after 1990 this recession reflects recent climate warming in inland asia

twentieth century warming preserved in a geladaindong mountain ice core central tibetan plateau high resolution 18 o records from a geladaindong mountain ice core spanning the period 1477 1982 were used to investigate past temperature variations in the yangtze river source region of the central tibetan plateau tp annual ice core 18 o records were positively correlated with temperature data from nearby meteorological stations suggesting that the 18 o record represented the air temperature in the region a generally increasing temperature trend over the past 500 years was identified with amplified warming during the 20th century a colder stage spanning before the 1850s was found to represent the little ice age with colder periods occurring during the 1470s 1500s 1580s 1660s 1700s 20s and 1770s 1840s compared with other temperature records from the tp and the northern hemisphere the geladaindong ice core record suggested that the regional climate of the central tp experienced a stronger warming trend during the 20th century than other regions in addition a positive relationship between the geladaindong 18 o values and the north atlantic oscillation index combined with a wavelet analysis of 18 o records indicated that there was a potential atmospheric teleconnection between the north atlantic and the central tp

timing of glacier fluctuations and trigger mechanisms in eastern qinghai tibetan plateau during the late quaternary abstract it is highly debated whether glacial advances on the qinghai tibetan plateau qtp occurred as a response to temperature cooling or whether they were forced by an increase in moisture brought by the intensive indian summer monsoon we here report a case study investigating this issue multiple moraine series in the yingpu valley queer shan ranges of the hengduan mountains and eastern qtp provide an excellent archive for examining the timing and trigger mechanism of glacier fluctuations twenty seven optically stimulated luminescence osl samples of glacial sediments were collected from this valley the quartz osl ages show that the moraine series of y 1 i m and o were formed during the late holocene late glacial the global last glacial maximum lgm and marine oxygen isotope stage mis 3 likely mid mis 3 the youngest y 2 moraines probably formed during the little ice age lia the oldest h moraines formed before mis 3 we found that glacial advances during the late quaternary at the yingpu valley responded to cold stages or cold events rather than episodes of enhanced summer monsoon and moisture as a result glaciers in the monsoonal hengduan mountains were mainly triggered by changes in temperature millennial time scale temperature oscillations might have caused the multiple glacial advances

a methodology for inversion of broadband seismic waveforms for elastic and anelastic structure and its application to the mantle transition zone beneath the northwestern pacific abstract we develop a quantitative and objective methodology for inversion of body wave waveform data for elastic and anelastic structure and apply it to the upper mantle and mantle transition zone mtz beneath the northwestern pacific using prem as the starting model we use the singular value decomposition svd as the basis for our inversion and use akaike s information criterion aic to evaluate the statistical significance of the models although the resulting models are preliminary we obtain an average positive s wave velocity anomaly in the mtz beneath the philippine sea plate and the japan sea we also find a negative s wave velocity anomaly in the depth range 300 400 km beneath the subduction zone to the east of northern japan and its southern extension beneath the izu bonin marianas arc our inversions obtained a lower q as compared to prem for all of the subregions

climatic changes in the qinghai xizang tibetan region of china during the holocene climatic changes in the qinghai xizang plateau of china were studied by analyzing the composition of peat and layers of sand and gravel distributed along the southern slopes of nianqing tanggula and gangdise mountains cross sections of deposits near a number of interior lakes in xizang past glacial variations on the southern slope of nianqing tanggula mountain and landform changes south of the yaluzangbu river such geologic evidence suggests a division of five climatic periods since the beginning of the holocene 1 the wumadung interval 10 000 7500 yr b p slightly cold and dry 2 qilongduo interval 7500 3000 yr b p warm and moist 3 the mid neoglacial period 3000 1500 yr b p cold except between 2500 and 200 yr b p when it was warmer 4 the dawelong interval 1500 300 yr b p mild and 5 the little ice age 300 0 yr b p cold these changes progressed in a similar but not identical pattern as those in the northeastern part of china and in the northern region of europe

late holocene temperature fluctuations on the tibetan plateau abstract proxy data of palaeoclimate like ice cores tree rings and lake sediments document aspects of climate changes on the tibetan plateau during the last 2000 years the results show that the tibetan plateau experienced climatic episodes such as the warm intervals during ad 800 1100 and 1150 1400 the little ice age between ad 1400 and 1900 and an earlier cold period between the 4th and 6th centuries in addition temperatures varied from region to region across the plateau a warm period from ad 800 to 1100 in the northeastern tibetan plateau was contemporaneous with cooling in the southern tibetan plateau which experienced warming between ad 1150 and 1400 large scale trends in the temperature history from the northeastern tibetan plateau resemble those in eastern china more than the trends from the southern plateau the most notable similarities between the temperature variations of the tibetan plateau and eastern china are cold phases during ad 1100 1150 1500 1550 1650 1700 and 1800 1850

holocene treeline shifts and monsoon variability in the hengduan mountains southeastern tibetan plateau implications from palynological investigations abstract the upper 8 45 m of a sediment core from lake naleng were analysed for its pollen and charcoal content to detect vegetation climate and human activity changes on the southeastern tibetan plateau tp since the pleistocene holocene transition 11 7 cal kyr bp the application of pollen indicator taxa pollen sums biomisation and multivariate analysis helped to reconstruct environmental conditions during the holocene furthermore 64 surface samples from the southeastern tp and its foreland were analysed to investigate the relationship between modern pollen assemblages and vegetation the modern vegetation was recorded in the surface pollen assemblages by pollen indicator types although sediments also contain pollen spectra extra regional pollen transported from lower vegetation belts which is seen as a consequence of steep elevation gradients at the southeastern margin of the tp the relation between different vegetation belts and temperature from the modern sample sites was used to infer quantitative temperature trends for the holocene record spreading of forests at the beginning of the holocene marks the transition to warmer conditions from 10 7 to 4 4 cal kyr bp open abies betula forests were found at lake naleng probably reflecting a stronger than present summer monsoon temperature range reconstructions suggest a temperature that was about 2 3 c warmer and a treeline position that was 400 600 m higher than today a severe climate deterioration with temperatures about 1 2 c colder than before is documented by a retreating forest between 8 1 and 7 2 cal kyr bp forests retreated while subalpine rhododendron shrubs spread around lake naleng indicating colder conditions with temperatures 1 2 c below early and mid holocene level after 4 4 cal kyr bp the forest decline at 4 4 cal kyr bp is considered to reflect climatic conditions as low concentrations of charcoal particles found in this period exclude human induced fires as reason for the forest retreat however grazing indicators imply human influence on the environment since 3 4 cal kyr bp around lake naleng we therefore consider the rapid treeline shift seen at 3 4 cal kyr bp as partly generated by human activity and partly by climatic conditions

the little ice age in the himalaya a review of glacier advance driven by northern hemisphere temperature change northern hemisphere cooling between 1400 and 1900 in the common era ce resulted in the expansion of glaciers during a period known as the little ice age lia early investigation of recent advances of himalayan glaciers assumed that these events were synchronous with lia advances identified in europe based on the appearance and position of moraines and without numerical age control however applications of quaternary dating techniques such as terrestrial cosmogenic nuclide dating have allowed researchers to determine numerical ages for these young moraines and clarify when glacial maxima occurred this paper reviews geochronological evidence for the last advance of glaciers in the himalaya the 66 ages younger than 2000 years 0 2000 ce calculated from 138 samples collected from glacial landforms demonstrate that peak moraine building occurred between 1300 and 1600 ce slightly earlier than the coldest period of northern hemisphere air temperatures the timing of lia advances varied spatially lik

reconstructing glacier retreat since the little ice age in se tibet by glacier mapping and equilibrium line altitude calculation abstract temperate glaciers in the eastern nyainqentanglha range southeastern tibet are highly sensitive to climate change and therefore of particular high interest for research on late holocene changes of the monsoonal climate in high asia however because of the remoteness of the area the scarcity of empirical data and the challenges to remote sensing work posed by cloud and snow cover knowledge about the glacier dynamics and changes in this region is still very limited in this study we applied a remote sensing approach in which 1964 glaciers were mapped from a landsat etm scene and subsequently parameterized by dem supported measurements geomorphological evidence i e trimlines and latero frontal moraines were used to obtain quantitative data on the glaciers morphological characteristics and the changes since the little ice age lia maximum glacier advance statistical analysis of glacier length change revealed an average retreat of 27 and a trend toward stronger retreat for smaller glaciers an evaluation of different methods to calculate equilibrium line altitudes elas indicates that an optimized toe to ridge altitude method tram is more suitable than other methods in settings with complex topography and a lack of mass balance measurements a large number of glacier measurements are crucial for high quality of tram results and special attention has to be paid to different glacier characteristics in order to determine the best fitting tram ratio value and to test the quality of the calculated elas a remote sensing approach was applied for each investigated glacier the altitudes of transient snowlines visible in the late summer landsat scene were measured from the dem and compared to tram results the interpolated ela results show a se nw gradient ranging from 4400 to 5600 m asl and an average ela rise of 136 m since the lia because of the high spatial resolution of measurements the ela distribution reveals topographic effects down to the catchment scale specifically orographic rainfall and leeward shielding the interpretation of these patterns reveals that the eastern nyainqentanglha range is influenced by both the indian ism and east asian summer monsoon easm however the easm does not reach the western part of the study area the results indicate that the monsoonal temperate glaciers high sensitivity to climate change is driven by two double forcings owing to the coincidence of accumulation and ablation phases