TY - JOUR A1 - Comas-Bru, Laia A1 - Harrison, Sandy P. A1 - Werner, Martin A1 - Rehfeld, Kira A1 - Scroxton, Nick A1 - Veiga-Pires, Cristina A1 - Ahmad, Syed Masood A1 - Brahim, Yassine Ait A1 - Mozhdehi, Sahar Amirnezhad A1 - Arienzo, Monica A1 - Atsawawaranunt, Kamolphat A1 - Baker, Andy A1 - Braun, Kerstin A1 - Breitenbach, Sebastian Franz Martin A1 - Burstyn, Yuval A1 - Chawchai, Sakonvan A1 - Columbu, Andrea A1 - Deininger, Michael A1 - Demeny, Attila A1 - Dixon, Bronwyn A1 - Hatvani, Istvan Gabor A1 - Hu, Jun A1 - Kaushal, Nikita A1 - Kern, Zoltan A1 - Labuhn, Inga A1 - Lachniet, Matthew S. A1 - Lechleitner, Franziska A. A1 - Lorrey, Andrew A1 - Markowska, Monika A1 - Nehme, Carole A1 - Novello, Valdir F. A1 - Oster, Jessica A1 - Perez-Mejias, Carlos A1 - Pickering, Robyn A1 - Sekhon, Natasha A1 - Wang, Xianfeng A1 - Warken, Sophie A1 - Atkinson, Tim A1 - Ayalon, Avner A1 - Baldini, James A1 - Bar-Matthews, Miryam A1 - Bernal, Juan Pablo A1 - Boch, Ronny A1 - Borsato, Andrea A1 - Boyd, Meighan A1 - Brierley, Chris A1 - Cai, Yanjun A1 - Carolin, Stacy A1 - Cheng, Hai A1 - Constantin, Silviu A1 - Couchoud, Isabelle A1 - Cruz, Francisco A1 - Denniston, Rhawn A1 - Dragusin, Virgil A1 - Duan, Wuhui A1 - Ersek, Vasile A1 - Finne, Martin A1 - Fleitmann, Dominik A1 - Fohlmeister, Jens Bernd A1 - Frappier, Amy A1 - Genty, Dominique A1 - Holzkamper, Steffen A1 - Hopley, Philip A1 - Johnston, Vanessa A1 - Kathayat, Gayatri A1 - Keenan-Jones, Duncan A1 - Koltai, Gabriella A1 - Li, Ting-Yong A1 - Lone, Mahjoor Ahmad A1 - Luetscher, Marc A1 - Mattey, Dave A1 - Moreno, Ana A1 - Moseley, Gina A1 - Psomiadis, David A1 - Ruan, Jiaoyang A1 - Scholz, Denis A1 - Sha, Lijuan A1 - Smith, Andrew Christopher A1 - Strikis, Nicolas A1 - Treble, Pauline A1 - Unal-Imer, Ezgi A1 - Vaks, Anton A1 - Vansteenberge, Stef A1 - Voarintsoa, Ny Riavo G. A1 - Wong, Corinne A1 - Wortham, Barbara A1 - Wurtzel, Jennifer A1 - Zhang, Haiwei T1 - Evaluating model outputs using integrated global speleothem records of climate change since the last glacial JF - Climate of the past : an interactive open access journal of the European Geosciences Union N2 - Although quantitative isotope data from speleothems has been used to evaluate isotope-enabled model simulations, currently no consensus exists regarding the most appropriate methodology through which to achieve this. A number of modelling groups will be running isotope-enabled palaeoclimate simulations in the framework of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 6, so it is timely to evaluate different approaches to using the speleothem data for data–model comparisons. Here, we illustrate this using 456 globally distributed speleothem δ18O records from an updated version of the Speleothem Isotopes Synthesis and Analysis (SISAL) database and palaeoclimate simulations generated using the ECHAM5-wiso isotope-enabled atmospheric circulation model. We show that the SISAL records reproduce the first-order spatial patterns of isotopic variability in the modern day, strongly supporting the application of this dataset for evaluating model-derived isotope variability into the past. However, the discontinuous nature of many speleothem records complicates the process of procuring large numbers of records if data–model comparisons are made using the traditional approach of comparing anomalies between a control period and a given palaeoclimate experiment. To circumvent this issue, we illustrate techniques through which the absolute isotope values during any time period could be used for model evaluation. Specifically, we show that speleothem isotope records allow an assessment of a model's ability to simulate spatial isotopic trends. Our analyses provide a protocol for using speleothem isotope data for model evaluation, including screening the observations to take into account the impact of speleothem mineralogy on δ18O values, the optimum period for the modern observational baseline and the selection of an appropriate time window for creating means of the isotope data for palaeo-time-slices. Y1 - 2019 U6 - https://doi.org/10.5194/cp-15-1557-2019 SN - 1814-9324 SN - 1814-9332 VL - 15 IS - 4 SP - 1557 EP - 1579 PB - Copernicus CY - Göttingen ER -