the Arctic Circle along the Norwegian coast, thereafter moving diagonally across Scandinavia. The boundary between the microthermal and polar climate zones is farthest north in western Europe (actually within the Arctic Circle there), and farthest south near the northeast coast of Canada (at about 56° North latitude on the central coast of Labrador); it then trends northward across Canada before dropping south again as it courses through Alaska. Throughout most of Siberia, the boundary tends to follow the Arctic Circle fairly closely. In addition to having various summer temperature regimes, microthermal climates also differ from one another in how much precipitation they receive — such climates may be humid, semiarid or arid. Most of the Turkestan-Gobi desert system has an arid microthermal climate, while the best-known example of the semiarid microthermal climate can be found in the "steppes of Central Asia" immortalized by Russian classical music composer Alexander Borodin. References Sources Unasylva - Vol.9, No. 2 - Climatic classification in forestry See also Megathermal Mesothermal Humid continental Subarctic Climate and weather classification systems