Tom Melvin

Position: Senior Research Associate Affiliation: Climatic Research Unit, School of Environmental Sciences, University of East Anglia Address: Dr. Thomas Melvin Climatic Research Unit University of East Anglia Norwich, NR4 7TJ, U.K. Phone: Email: +44-1603-593161 t.m.melvin@uea.ac.uk Research Area: Environmental Science - Paleoclimate - Dendroclimatology

See my ENV profile page for more information about my research and my full publication list.

My research is focused on extracting common growth signals from series of tree-growth measurements. I am currently working on a project to apply tree-growth modelling techniques to develop Process-Based Standardisation funded by the Leverhulme Foundation.

My previous work, all within the Climatic Research Unit, includes a NERC funded PhD Thesis investigating dendroclimatic standardisation techniques, work within the ALPIMP project on extracting climatic signals from large collections of tree-ring measurements and climate data from the greater Alpine region, and RAPID, a NERC funded project examining errors and confidence levels of climate reconstructions. I have developed computer programs to support dendroclimatic research and am currently working to make these publicly available.

Publications:

• Briffa, K. R., and Melvin T. M. (2008) A closer look at Regional Curve Standardisation of tree-ring records: justification of the need, a warning of some pitfalls, and suggested improvements in its application. In: Hughes MK, Diaz HF, Swetnam TW (eds) Dendroclimatology: Progress and Prospects. Springer Verlag, p (in press)
• Melvin, T. M., and Briffa, K. R. (2008). A "Signal-Free" approach to Dendroclimatic Standardisation. Dendrochronologia 26:71-86 (full text, data)
• Larsen, L.B., Vinther, B.M., Briffa, K.R., Melvin, T.M., Clausen, H.B., Jones, P.D., et al, 2008 New ice core evidence for a volcanic cause of the A.D. 536 dust veil. Geophysical Research Letters, 35, L04708, doi:10.1029/2007GL032450 (fig 1 data)
• Briffa, K. R., Shishov, V. V., Melvin, T. M., Vaganov, E. A., Grudd, H., Hantemirov, R. M., Eronen, M., and Naurzbaev, M. M. (2008). Trends in recent Temperature and Radial Tree Growth spanning 2000 years across Northwest Eurasia. Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B 363, doi:10.1098/rstb.2007.2199 (data)
• Leal, S., Melvin, T. M., Grabner, M., Wimmer, R., and Briffa, K. R. (2007). Tree-ring growth variability in the Austrian Alps: the influence of site, altitude, tree species and climate (vol 36, pg 426, 2007). Boreas 36, 459-459.
• Melvin, T. M., Briffa, K. R., Nicolussi, K., and Grabner, M. (2007). Time-varying-response smoothing. Dendrochronologia 25, 65-69. doi:10.1016/j.dendro.2007.01.004 (full text, fig 1 data)
• Melvin, T. M. (2004). Historical growth rates and changing climatic sensitivity of boreal conifers. Unpublished PhD thesis, University of East Anglia, Norwich