East Asian Environmental and Climatic Evolution During the Quaternary: Records, Mechanisms, and Implications

Dear Colleagues,

East Asia represents one of the most dynamic and sensitive regions in the global climate system, characterized by the interplay of the East Asian monsoon, the westerlies, the Tibetan Plateau's thermal and mechanical forcing, and the intricate land–sea interactions along the western Pacific margin. During the Quaternary—the past ~2.6 million years (Ma) encompassing the interglacial–glacial cycle—this region experienced profound environmental and climatic transformations, including dramatic monsoon intensity fluctuations, repeated millennial-scale abrupt events, substantial sea-level oscillations, and large-scale landscape and ecosystem reorganizations. These changes not only shaped the physical environment but also exerted critical influences on human evolution, migration, subsistence strategies, and the emergence of early agriculture and complex societies.

The rich diversity of natural archives across East Asia—speleothems from cave systems, eolian deposits from the Chinese Loess Plateau and beyond, lacustrine and peat sediments from the Tibetan Plateau and monsoonal basins, marine sediments from marginal seas, ice cores from high-altitude glaciers, and tree rings from long-lived conifers—provides an unparalleled opportunity to investigate Quaternary climate dynamics across a broad range of temporal and spatial scales. In recent decades, methodological advances—including high-precision U-Th dating, clumped and triple-oxygen isotope analyses, lipid biomarker paleothermometry, non-traditional stable isotopes, ancient environmental DNA, and machine-learning-assisted paleoenvironmental reconstructions—have substantially enhanced our ability to decipher complex environmental signals and quantify past climate parameters.

Despite these advances, significant knowledge gaps persist. The spatiotemporal patterns of East Asian monsoon variability and their driving mechanisms remain debated, particularly regarding the relative roles of insolation forcing, ice volume, greenhouse gases, and internal climate modes. The regional expressions of global abrupt climate events and their underlying teleconnection mechanisms require further elucidation. Moreover, the responses of terrestrial and marine ecosystems to Quaternary climate change, the interactions between environmental degradation and societal resilience or collapse, and the coupling between continental weathering, sediment routing systems, and marginal sea sedimentation in relation to monsoon and sea-level changes are all frontiers that demand interdisciplinary investigation.

This Special Issue aims to provide a platform for researchers to present novel data, innovative methodologies, and integrative syntheses that advance our understanding of Quaternary environmental and climatic evolution in East Asia. We particularly encourage contributions that link multi-archive records, bridge terrestrial and marine realms, integrate paleoclimate reconstructions with numerical simulations, and/or explore the impacts of past climate changes on human societies. By bringing together diverse perspectives, this collection seeks to foster a more holistic and mechanistic understanding of East Asia's environmental dynamics during a period that holds direct relevance for assessing current and future climate trajectories.

Dr. Lingkang Chen
Dr. Fangming Zeng
Guest Editors

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• environment change
• climate change
• speleothems/stalagmites
• eolian deposits
• soil deposit
• lake sediments
• peat deposits
• marine sediments
• ice cores
• tree rings
• fluvial archives
• coastal sediments
• paleotemperature reconstruction
• paleoprecipitation reconstruction
• monsoon intensity
• weathering history
• anthropogenic activity and land use change