May 23, 2007 — Weather events that occur in the distant Pacific and West Africa help determine the frequency of major hurricanes that strike the Caribbean and West Atlantic, according to research to be published on Thursday.

The study touches on one of the big puzzles about climate change: Will global warming, by heating the seas that give hurricanes their power, also make these storms more frequent?

Experts poring over this question face a problem in getting a long-term perspective so that they can compare the effects of recent man-made global warming with past, naturally-caused bouts of climate change.