Monsoon intensity driven by Earth's orbit: study

0 Comments | AFP, February, 2008

PARIS (AFP) — The monsoon rains that drench tropical and subtropical Asia from June through September vary in duration and intensity in keeping with tiny wobbles in Earth's orbit as it circles the Sun, according to a study released Wednesday.

These cycles wax and wane every 23,000 years, said the study, based on the breakthrough use of stalagmites from a cave in central-eastern China to measure changes in climate patterns over the last quarter million years.

"The implications are that the present Asian summer monsoon is relatively weak in comparison to a few thousand years ago and that is will stay at this level for centuries more," lead researcher Hai Cheng of Nanjing Normal University in China's Jiangsu Province told AFP.

The findings, however, do not take...