Woody legacies of railroad ties from the Southern Atacama Desert used to strengthen Nothofagus obliqua tree-ring chronologies from Northern Patagonia
Year: 2025
Type: article
Abstract: During the late Nineteenth and Twentieth centuries there was an intense exploitation of the long-lived Nothofagus obliqua forests in the temperate region of South America due to the quality of their hardwood. This exploitation resulted in degradation of this Northern Patagonian ecosystem with severe biodiversity implications. This also has prevented the development of multicentury N. obliqua tree-ring width chronologies, with implications for regional environmental and paleoclimatological studies. The large-scale manufacturing of railroad ties distributed across Chile drove part of this exploitation. This study evaluated the use of this cultural material from abandoned tracks preserved in the southern Atacama Desert to strengthen the existing N. obliqua tree-ring network in Patagonia. We dated this historical wood using classical crossdating ring-width methods corroborated with wiggle matching of radiocarbon series from railroad tree-rings using the hemispheric 14 C curve. Correlation analysis with climate data and paleoclimate field reconstructions shows a clear hydroclimate signal contained in the resulting regional tree-ring record with a consistent spatial pattern across northern Patagonia. The dendrochronological use of railroad ties preserved in the Atacama Desert opens a new avenue for dendroclimatic studies and highlights its heritage importance as a past environmental archive in southwestern South America.
Source: Scientific Reports
Language: English
Topic: Tree-ring climate responses
Subfield: Atmospheric Science
Field: Earth and Planetary Sciences
Domain: Physical Sciences
SDGs: Life on land, Climate action
Open Access status: gold
Estimated APC paid: $2,690
Awards: G2279907414, FROM HYPER DROUGHT TO HEAVY RAINFALL ASSESSING CHANGES IN THE FREQUENCY OF HYDROCLIMATIC EXTREMES EVENTS AND THEIR IMPACTS ON FOREST ECOSYSTEMS TO SUPPORT CLIMATE RISK PLANNING IN CHILE., TOWARDS A COMPREHENSIVE UNDERSTANDING OF THE PHYSIOLOGICAL TRAITS AND ENVIRONMENTAL DRIVERS ASSOCIATED WITH DROUGHT INDUCED DIEBACK IN NOTHOFAGUS SPECIES IN CHILE, SOUTHERN HEMISPHERE WESTERLY WIND BELT DYNAMICS DURING THE LAST MILLENNIUM, DISENTANGLING THE INFLUENCE OF CLIMATE EXTREMES AND HUMAN ACTIVITY ON FIRE REGIMES OF COASTAL AND ANDEAN ARAUCARIA FORESTS DURING THE LAST MILLENNIUM, G4299968906, CENTER FOR CLIMATE AND RESILIENCE RESEARCH (CR)2, G4312145593, G4953622269, G527338111, G5338688157, FIRE HISTORY OF ARAUCARIA FORESTS IN THE NAHUELBUTA COASTAL RANGE (37°-38°S) THE ROLES OF HUMANS AND CLIMATE DURING THE LAST MILLENNIUM, G6141898124, G6957102488, MILLENIUM NUCLEUS OF PATAGONIAN LIMIT-OF-LIFE: ENVIRONMENTAL CONSTRAINTS ON GENETICS AND ECOPHYSIOLOGY, CENTRO CABO DE HORNOS (CHIC), ASSESSING HISTORICAL CHANGES OF WATER EXTREME EVENTS AND THEIR IMPACTS ON VEGETATION WATER ACCESS AND INFRASTRUCTURE PLANNING IN MEDITERRANEAN AND SEMI-ARID BASINS OF CHILE
OpenAlex ID: W4410207409