Statistical physics approaches to the complex Earth system
- 1. Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, Potsdam 14412, Germany
Description
Global warming, extreme climate events, earthquakes and their accompanying socioeconomic
disasters pose significant risks to humanity. Yet due to the nonlinear feedbacks,
multiple interactions and complex structures of the Earth system, the understanding and,
in particular, the prediction of such disruptive events represent formidable challenges
to both scientific and policy communities. During the past years, the emergence and
evolution of Earth system science has attracted much attention and produced new
concepts and frameworks. Especially, novel statistical physics and complex networksbased
techniques have been developed and implemented to substantially advance our
knowledge of the Earth system, including climate extreme events, earthquakes and
geological relief features, leading to substantially improved predictive performances.
We present here a comprehensive review on the recent scientific progress in the
development and application of how combined statistical physics and complex systems
science approaches such as critical phenomena, network theory, percolation, tipping
points analysis, and entropy can be applied to complex Earth systems. Notably, these
integrating tools and approaches provide new insights and perspectives for understanding
the dynamics of the Earth systems. The overall aim of this review is to offer readers
the knowledge on how statistical physics concepts and theories can be useful in the field
of Earth system science.
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2.1-s2.0-S0370157320303458-main.pdf
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