Nick Scroxton

New for @ScienceNews: On the island of Flores, there lived the hobbits. Until 50,000 years ago, when they vanish from the fossil record. It now seems lack of rainfall may have been a factor. sciencenews.org/article/drough…

Declining river flows forced Stegodon and the hobbit out of their remote mountain refuge, potentially bringing the face to face with Homo sapiens. nature.com/articles/s4324…

We combined a new stalagmite geochemical record of seasonal rainfall variability with archaeological evidence to show an extreme summer rainfall drought beginning 61,000 years ago coincided with declines in the hobbit's key prey, the pygmy elephant Stegodon.

Who killed the hobbit? 💀🐘🦴⛰️🌧️☀️🪨⛏️ Our new paper out today in Communications Earth and Environment reveals the role of a major drought in the disappearance of the diminutive hominin Homo floresiensis. theconversation.com/the-hobbits-my…

Published a new paper, this place is empty. Perhaps find out more about it here: bsky.app/profile/stalag… 🦋🦋

Work was funded by NSF Grant 2002556. Paper Here: doi.org/10.1029/2024PA… Free link: onlinelibrary.wiley.com/share/author/X…

We did find an abrupt isotopic enrichment 3.9-3.6 kyr BP. This ‘tropical climate shift’ is becoming more evident in high-res records and is temporally distinct to 4.2 (take note low res records), supporting previous work and the Double Drying hypothesis (Scroxton et al., 2023).

Kicking off the new year with a 📣New Paper📣in @AGU_Paleo, led by Alexander James at USC, with @junhu_climate, @StellarGeay, @junglecave and others. In it we explore whether we can find regime changes in the Holocene Asian Summer Monsoons. We can for 8.2, but 4.2 falls short.

Of course, seeing an event at the right time but not of unusual magnitude is no guarantee of it being the event in question. Individual studies must therefore be more cautious of positive results bias and confirmation bias when it comes to abrupt climate change events.

We posit a difference in language where different studies target different sphere's of influence of a climate event: individual studies delineate a 'detection sphere', while statistical studies delineate an 'impact sphere'. The difference being the significance of the event.

📢New Paper! In our opinion piece "The Hunt for Holocene Abrupt Climate Change" in #PLOSClimate, @npmckay and myself ask why are ACCs found easily in individual studies but not in compilations? dx.plos.org/10.1371/journa…

Busy, fun days in #Achill. Sharing #climatechange conversations & games as part of @Researchirel #Scienceweek & finding time for hopscotch & beach walks! Hearing what people are observing locally too. Huge thanks to fab hosts @circus250 & to the community #sciencecomms #outreach

🦋🦋made a move to the other app🦋🦋

Doing good science is 90% finding a science buddy to constantly talk to about the project.

PRISM acronym! Bubble-Text sign! We're diving into the science cliches today.

AI generated podcasts for your paper? I tried out Google Notebook LM with my 4.2ka event paper. Its overly simplistic and a little inane in places, and gets a few things factually wrong. But still quite astonishing. notebooklm.google.com/notebook/380eb…

Escalating language isn't working. Climate change is climate change. Climate crisis and climate emergency doesn't make ordinary people more concerned. Note: authors didn't test whether climate globalmegaclusterf*ck worked. theconversation.com/if-you-want-am… via @ConversationUS

Quite beautiful. And coming from the ANU archives, comforting to know someone has read at least part of my thesis, and to see the wise words of friends. (@DrDomTanner @OceanTerra @ToothDetective, you're all in here!) science.anu.edu.au/news-events/ne…

As my latest grant proposal document ticks over 17,500 words, its nice to know that my hard work will...