Anthropogenic warming has exacerbated droughts in southern Europe since the 1850s

Widespread and frequent droughts have affected most parts of Europe over recent years, but it remains unclear when this synchronous drying trend began and how it has been influenced by anthropogenic forcing. Here we reconstruct and explore the history of drought in southern Europe over the past 300 years using an annual record of tree-ring oxygen isotopes from a site in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The reconstruction suggests that the onset of the drying trend in southern Europe occurred around the 1850s, which is consistent with previous studies demonstrating the extensive and long-lasting drying across central and western European areas. The evidence from CMIP6 model and reanalysis data demonstrates that anthropogenic warming has enhanced the strength of land-atmosphere coupling and exacerbated the widespread drying trend since the 1850s. Southern Europe has experienced a persistent drying trend that began in the 1850s and is probably the result of warming and close coupling between soil moisture and atmospheric temperature, suggest analyses of a 300-year oxygen isotope record from tree rings from one site in Bosnia and Herzegovina

Automated summary

Widespread and frequent droughts have affected most parts of Europe over recent years. The onset of the drying trend in southern Europe occurred around the 1850s, and anthropogenic warming has enhanced the strength of land-atmosphere coupling and exacerbated the widespread drying trend since then. This persistent drying trend in southern Europe is likely the result of warming and close coupling between soil moisture and atmospheric temperature.