Climate teleconnections among the Earth's three poles

The Arctic, Antarctic, and Tibetan Plateau (TP) are often referred to as Earth's three poles, and they exert outsized influence on the global climate. The three poles have undergone accelerating loss of sea ice, ice shelves, and/or glaciers, accompanied by pronounced warming in the Arctic and TP and region-specific warming in Antarctica. Despite their geographical remoteness, the three poles exhibit evident linkages, yet substantial gaps remain in our understanding of their climate teleconnections. This review summarizes the interactions among Earth's three poles. The three poles are dynamically linked through a hierarchy of pathways. The Arctic-TP interactions are dominated by stationary Rossby-wave trains triggered by sea-ice and snow anomalies and reinforced by land-surface feedback over the plateau. The Arctic-Antarctic coupling relies on ocean heat transport through the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation and on the modulation of tropical Atlantic temperature and the Intertropical Convergence Zone. The Antarctic-TP signals travel via sea-surface temperature anomalies in the Indian Ocean forced by the Antarctic Oscillation, which propagate northward and excite wave trains and transport moisture onto the TP. Closing the remaining knowledge gaps will require coordinated paleoclimate constraints, targeted field campaigns over the Southern Ocean and TP, and next-generation Earth-system models equipped with machine-learning techniques. Such integrative efforts are essential for more reliable projections of compound extremes and for informing adaptation strategies.