A B S T R A C T This research concerns the transport of mineral dust from the arid regions of Asia to the open North Pacific Ocean over the last 18,000 years. New analysis will be carried out on selected deep sea cores to improve the resolution and the coverage of the data. Meteorological models of transport will be used to assess the variation with time of the latitudinal distribution of mineral dust transport and deposition, the likely variation in the source areas, and the speed of transport. These calculations will be based upon climatological fields simulated by NCAR's Community Climate Model obtained under the COHMAP project. The transport results will be compared with sedimentological results on the latitudinal distribution of the minerology, grain size distribution and mass accumulation rates over the past 18,000 years. Together, the climatological and sedimentological research will allow an assessment of the capability of transport models and refine our understanding of climate variations deduced from geological evidence.
