Search for: All records

Abstract Previous studies suggest that meridional migrations of the Antarctic Circumpolar Current may have altered wind-driven upwelling and carbon dioxide degassing in the Southern Ocean during past climate transitions. Here, we report a quantitative and continuous record of the Antarctic Circumpolar Current latitude over the last glacial-interglacial cycle, using biomarker-based reconstructions of surface layer temperature gradient in the southern Indian Ocean. The results show that the Antarctic Circumpolar Current was more equatorward during the ice ages and shifted ~6° poleward at the end of glacial terminations, consistent with Antarctic Circumpolar Current migration playing a role in glacial-interglacial atmospheric carbon dioxide change. Comparing the temporal evolution of the Antarctic Circumpolar Current mean latitude with other observations provides evidence that Earth’s axial tilt affects the strength and latitude range of Southern Ocean wind-driven upwelling, which may explain previously noted deviations in atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration from a simple correlation with Antarctic climate. 

The Antarctic Circumpolar Current (ACC) represents the world’s largest ocean-current system and affects global ocean circulation, climate and Antarctic ice-sheet stability^1–3. Today, ACC dynamics are controlled by atmospheric forcing, oceanic density gradients and eddy activity⁴. Whereas palaeoceanographic reconstructions exhibit regional heterogeneity in ACC position and strength over Pleistocene glacial–interglacial cycles^5–8, the long-term evolution of the ACC is poorly known. Here we document changes in ACC strength from sediment cores in the Pacific Southern Ocean. We find no linear long-term trend in ACC flow since 5.3 million years ago (Ma), in contrast to global cooling⁹and increasing global ice volume¹⁰. Instead, we observe a reversal on a million-year timescale, from increasing ACC strength during Pliocene global cooling to a subsequent decrease with further Early Pleistocene cooling. This shift in the ACC regime coincided with a Southern Ocean reconfiguration that altered the sensitivity of the ACC to atmospheric and oceanic forcings^11–13. We find ACC strength changes to be closely linked to 400,000-year eccentricity cycles, probably originating from modulation of precessional changes in the South Pacific jet stream linked to tropical Pacific temperature variability¹⁴. A persistent link between weaker ACC flow, equatorward-shifted opal deposition and reduced atmospheric CO₂during glacial periods first emerged during the Mid-Pleistocene Transition (MPT). The strongest ACC flow occurred during warmer-than-present intervals of the Plio-Pleistocene, providing evidence of potentially increasing ACC flow with future climate warming. 

In paleoceanography, carbon and oxygen stable isotope ratios from benthic foraminifera are used as tracers of physical and biogeochemical properties of the deep ocean. We present the first version of the Ocean Carbon Cycling working group database,  of stable isotope ratios of oxygen and carbon from benthic foraminifera from deep ocean sediment cores from the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM, 23-20 ky before present (BP)) to the Holocene (<10 ky BP) with a particular focus on the early last deglaciation (20-15 ky BP). It includes 287 globally distributed coring sites, with metadata, isotopic and chronostratigraphic information, and age models. A quality check was performed for all data and age models. Sites with at least millennial resolution were preferred, because the main goal is to resolve ocean changes associated with the last deglaciation on at least millennial timescales. Software tools were produced to access and analyze the data, and are included with this publication. Deep water mass structure as well as differences between the early deglaciation and LGM are captured by the data in the compilation, even though its coverage is still sparse in many ocean regions. We find high correlations among time series calculated with different age models at sites that allow such analysis. The database provides a useful dynamical approach to map physical and biogeochemical changes of the ocean throughout the last deglaciation.</p> Custom python scripts to read and analyze the data base may be found in https://github.com/juanmuglia/OC3-python-scripts and in OC3-python-scripts.zip in this repository. plots_d13c.pdf and plots_d18o.pdf contain time series for all sites and available age models. 

Abstract We present the first version of the Ocean Circulation and Carbon Cycling (OC3) working group database, of oxygen and carbon stable isotope ratios from benthic foraminifera in deep ocean sediment cores from the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM, 23-19 ky) to the Holocene (<10 ky) with a particular focus on the early last deglaciation (19-15 ky BP). It includes 287 globally distributed coring sites, with metadata, isotopic and chronostratigraphic information, and age models. A quality check was performed for all data and age models, and sites with at least millennial resolution were preferred. Deep water mass structure as well as differences between the early deglaciation and LGM are captured by the data, even though its coverage is still sparse in many regions. We find high correlations among time series calculated with different age models at sites that allow such analysis. The database provides a useful dynamical approach to map physical and biogeochemical changes of the ocean throughout the last deglaciation.