Influence of the WeMO and NAO decadal trends on the airborne pollen levels recorded in Catalonia (NW Mediterranean basin)

Abstract

Airborne pollen records constitute a powerful tool for different purposes. First, in studies of dispersion and source identification of pollen grains, which, incorporated into the atmosphere by anemophilous plants, produce allergic symptoms in a part of the population sensitive to it. On the other hand, aerobiological databases provide useful information for the understanding of the trends induced by the climate change. The decadal series allow the extraction of patterns with intra-annual variability (seasonality of the events and their relationship with the atmospheric transport patterns) and inter-annual variability (inter-annual trends and its possible relationship with climatic variability indexes). The longer the aerobiological monitoring series the better the understanding of the effects of climate change on pollination trends. The aim of this study is to explore the influence of climate change on the airborne pollen series recorded in Catalonia during the period 1994-2012 by the analysis of its correlation with both, the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) and the new regional teleconnection Western Mediterranean Oscillation (WeMO) defined within the synoptic framework of the western Mediterranean basin.