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Journal Article

Tipping point detection and early warnings in climate, ecological, and human systems

Authors

Dakos,  Vasilis
External Organizations;

Boulton,  Chris A.
External Organizations;

Buxton,  Josh E.
External Organizations;

Abrams,  Jesse F.
External Organizations;

McKay,  David I. Armstrong
External Organizations;

Bathiany,  Sebastian
External Organizations;

/persons/resource/lana.blaschke

Blaschke,  Lana
Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research;

/persons/resource/Niklas.Boers

Boers,  Niklas
Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research;

Dylewsky,  Daniel
External Organizations;

López-Martínez,  Carlos
External Organizations;

Parry,  Isobel
External Organizations;

Ritchie,  Paul
External Organizations;

van der Bolt,  Bregje
External Organizations;

van der Laan,  Larissa
External Organizations;

Weinans,  Els
External Organizations;

Kéfi,  Sonia
External Organizations;

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Fulltext (public)

30024oa.pdf
(Publisher version), 4MB

Supplementary Material (public)
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Citation

Dakos, V., Boulton, C. A., Buxton, J. E., Abrams, J. F., McKay, D. I. A., Bathiany, S., Blaschke, L., Boers, N., Dylewsky, D., López-Martínez, C., Parry, I., Ritchie, P., van der Bolt, B., van der Laan, L., Weinans, E., Kéfi, S. (2024): Tipping point detection and early warnings in climate, ecological, and human systems. - Earth System Dynamics, 15, 4, 1117-1135.
https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-15-1117-2024


Cite as: https://publications.pik-potsdam.de/pubman/item/item_30024
Abstract
Tipping points characterize the situation when a system experiences abrupt, rapid, and sometimes irreversible changes in response to only a gradual change in environmental conditions. Given that such events are in most cases undesirable, numerous approaches have been proposed to identify if a system is approaching a tipping point. Such approaches have been termed early warning signals and represent a set of methods for identifying statistical changes in the underlying behaviour of a system across time or space that would be indicative of an approaching tipping point. Although the idea of early warnings for a class of tipping points is not new, in the last 2 decades, the topic has generated an enormous amount of interest, mainly theoretical. At the same time, the unprecedented amount of data originating from remote sensing systems, field measurements, surveys, and simulated data, coupled with innovative models and cutting-edge computing, has made possible the development of a multitude of tools and approaches for detecting tipping points in a variety of scientific fields. However, we miss a complete picture of where, how, and which early warnings have been used so far in real-world case studies. Here we review the literature of the last 20 years to show how the use of these indicators has spread from ecology and climate to many other disciplines. We document what metrics have been used; their success; and the field, system, and tipping points involved. We find that, despite acknowledged limitations and challenges, in the majority of the case studies we reviewed, the performance of most early warnings was positive in detecting tipping points. Overall, the generality of the approaches employed – the fact that most early warnings can in theory be observed in many dynamical systems – explains the continuous multitude and diversification in their application across scientific domains.