Last month, a study was published that examined climate change's direct effects on Earth's seasons. Scientists found a connection between climate change and the temperature and duration of the summer season. If left unaccounted for, summers in the Northern Hemisphere could last nearly six months by the year 2100 if global warming continues in its tracks, according to the study. With the seasons off-balance, it will further domino with harmful effects for human health and agriculture.
Yuping Guan, a physical oceanographer at the State Key Laboratory of Tropical Oceanography at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and his colleagues combined daily climate data from 1952-2011 to get a sense of the start and end of each season in the Northern Hemisphere. Over a nearly 60-year period, they discovered that summers grew, on average 78 to 95 days long, while winters on average shortened from 76-73 days. The spring and autumn seasons also reduced. Guan and his team used the findings from the data to create a model to hypothesize（假设）how the seasons can possibly change in the future. They found that if left untouched summers in the Northern Hemisphere could last nearly six months, while winters could deplete to less than two months.
If Earth's seasons continue to shift, it brings negative risk among human health and agriculture. Longer and hotter summers, for example, can cause mosquitoes and other disease-carrying insects to potentially "expand" their scope and land in places they're usually not found. "Because seasons influence the life cycles of plants and animals, climate change could disrupt species' ability to adapt. Scott Sheridan, a climate scientist also added, "If seasons start changing, everything isn't going to change perfectly as they should. If we take an example of flowers coming out of the ground, those flowers could come out, but bees aren't there to pollinate (授粉) yet or they're already past their peak." With negative effects like these, human health and agriculture face hardships moving forward.
This study further demonstrates how harsh climate change is on humans, plants and animals, reminding us how much we are all connected within the environment we share.
