International Tree-Ring Data Bank

International Tree-Ring Data Bank
Name	International Tree-Ring Data Bank
Formation	1974
Founder	Frits Went; Irvine F. Wood; Hal B. Bentz
Type	Repository
Headquarters	University of Arizona
Location	Tucson, Arizona
Region served	Global
Parent organization	International Union of Forest Research Organizations

Contents

International Tree-Ring Data Bank

The International Tree-Ring Data Bank is a global repository for dendrochronological data established to aggregate tree-ring chronologies and raw ring-width measurements from studies across continents. It supports meta-analyses in climate science, archaeology, ecology, and geology by providing standardized datasets contributed by researchers affiliated with institutions such as University of Arizona, NOAA, National Science Foundation, Smithsonian Institution, and European Commission. The archive interfaces with projects and organizations including World Meteorological Organization, United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, and International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme.

History and development

The Data Bank traces origins to collaborations among researchers linked to Tree-Ring Research Laboratory, University of Arizona, Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research, and early funders like National Science Foundation and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration during the 1960s and 1970s. Influential figures and institutions such as A. E. Douglass, Gunnar Östlund, Hal F. Schweingruber, Edward Cook, and Tommy H. Swetnam contributed chronologies that underpinned milestones recognized by International Union of Forest Research Organizations conferences and workshops at Royal Society venues and Smithsonian Institution symposia. Key programmatic shifts occurred after meetings involving representatives from United States Geological Survey, European Commission Directorate-General for Research and Innovation, Canadian Forestry Service, and Australian Research Council, which broadened geographic scope to include datasets from Siberia, Amazon Basin, Himalayas, Andes Mountains, and Antarctica projects. Growth phases paralleled developments at World Data Center repositories and harmonization efforts tied to standards advocated by International Organization for Standardization committees.

Holdings encompass raw ring-width series, measured latewood/earlywood indices, density measurements, and crossdated master chronologies from regions studied by teams affiliated with Columbia University, University of Cambridge, University of Oxford, Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research, and Chinese Academy of Sciences. The collection includes paleoclimate records implicated in research with Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change assessments, dendroarchaeology linked to excavations managed by British Museum, Metropolitan Museum of Art, and National Museum of China, and ecological datasets used by World Wildlife Fund and Conservation International. Notable geographic coverage features sites in Rocky Mountains, Scandinavian Peninsula, Caucasus, Patagonia, Tasmania, Japan, Mongolia, Sahara fringe, and New Zealand. The repository holds chronologies connected to landmark studies by teams at Harvard University, Yale University, Princeton University, Max Planck Society, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, and ETH Zurich.

Contributors range from principal investigators at University of California, Berkeley and University of Washington to postgraduate teams at University of Melbourne, University of Toronto, and Peking University. Submission protocols were shaped through consultations with standards bodies including International Council for Science and curators from British Antarctic Survey, National Center for Atmospheric Research, and Plymouth Marine Laboratory. Curation workflows involve quality control by specialists formerly affiliated with NOAA Paleoclimatology Program, National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis, and the International Tree-Ring Society, incorporating crossdating verification used in studies conducted at Lamont–Doherty Earth Observatory, Scripps Institution of Oceanography, and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. Data provenance, contributor attribution, and embargo policies reflect practices adopted by Nature Research and Science (journal) editorial standards, with metadata schemes interoperable with repositories managed by DataCite and Digital Antiquity.

Datasets are accessible via institutional portals maintained by University of Arizona and mirrored through services associated with NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, PANGAEA, and Global Biodiversity Information Facility. Files are provided in formats compatible with analysis packages developed at R Project, Matlab, Python Software Foundation, and tools from US Geological Survey. Common formats include columnar ASCII, Tucson dendrochronology format, and NetCDF versions adopted by European Space Agency projects. Access levels follow contributor preferences and align with open data policies advocated by Open Science Framework, Wellcome Trust, and Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation grant conditions.

Researchers at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Columbia University, University College London, Zürich ETH, Purdue University, and Cornell University employ Data Bank records in paleoclimate reconstructions used in Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change reports and regional studies by National Aeronautics and Space Administration. Archaeologists from Oxford Archaeology, Archaeological Institute of America, and Institute of Archaeology, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences use chronologies to date timber in structures related to Ming Dynasty and Medieval Warm Period investigations. Ecologists from Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute and Scripps Institution of Oceanography integrate ring-width records into studies on drought impacts and fire regimes alongside research by US Forest Service and Canadian Forest Service. Applications extend to calibration for isotope work at Argonne National Laboratory and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and cross-disciplinary syntheses published in Nature, Science, and Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Category:Dendrochronology Category:Climate data repositories