Paleocirculation of the deep north atlantic: 150,000-year record of benthic foraminifera and oxygen-18

Benthic foraminiferal faunas in a piston core from 3331 meters at 44 degrees N on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge show striking variations in the relative abundance of species. Uvigerina peregrina, which is broadly distributed today in the South Atlantic and in the Pacific in water that has been long isolated from the surface, is absent in the North and Equatorial Atlantic at depths occupied by highly oxygenated North Atlantic deep water. This species dominated the fauna at this site for much of the past 150,000 years. It is suggested that North Atlantic deepwater production was much reduced or eliminated at times of Uvigerina peregrina abundance, as a result of cooling and stratification of the Norwegian Sea surface, coincident with the times of the southward migration of the polar front in the North Atlantic.     

Abrupt climate events 500,000 to 340,000 years ago: evidence from subpolar north atlantic sediments

Subpolar North Atlantic proxy records document millennial-scale climate variations 500,000 to 340,000 years ago. The cycles have an approximately constant pacing that is similar to that documented for the last glacial cycle. These findings suggest that such climate variations are inherent to the late Pleistocene, regardless of glacial state. Sea surface temperature during the warm peak of Marine Isotope Stage 11 (MIS 11) varied by 0.5 degrees to 1 degrees C, less than the 4 degrees to 4.5 degrees C estimated during times of ice growth and the 3 degrees C estimated for glacial maxima. Coherent deep ocean circulation changes were associated with glacial oscillations in sea surface temperature.     

The salinity,temperature, and delta18O of the glacial deep ocean

We use pore fluid measurements of the chloride concentration and the oxygen isotopic composition from Ocean Drilling Program cores to reconstruct salinity and temperature of the deep ocean during the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM). Our data show that the temperatures of the deep Pacific, Southern, and Atlantic oceans during the LGM were relatively homogeneous and within error of the freezing point of seawater at the ocean's surface. Our chloride data show that the glacial stratification was dominated by salinity variations, in contrast with the modern ocean, for which temperature plays a primary role. During the LGM the Southern Ocean contained the saltiest water in the deep ocean. This reversal of the modern salinity contrast between the North and South Atlantic implies that the freshwater budget at the poles must have been quite different. A strict conversion of mean salinity at the LGM to equivalent sea-level change yields a value in excess of 140 meters. However, the storage of fresh water in ice shelves and/or groundwater reserves implies that glacial salinity is a poor predictor of mean sea level.     

Trajectory shifts in the Arctic and subarctic freshwater cycle

Manifold changes in the freshwater cycle of high-latitude lands and oceans have been reported in the past few years. A synthesis of these changes in freshwater sources and in ocean freshwater storage illustrates the complementary and synoptic temporal pattern and magnitude of these changes over the past 50 years. Increasing river discharge anomalies and excess net precipitation on the ocean contributed approximately 20,000 cubic kilometers of fresh water to the Arctic and high-latitude North Atlantic oceans from lows in the 1960s to highs in the 1990s. Sea ice attrition provided another approximately 15,000 cubic kilometers, and glacial melt added approximately 2000 cubic kilometers. The sum of anomalous inputs from these freshwater sources matched the amount and rate at which fresh water accumulated in the North Atlantic during much of the period from 1965 through 1995. The changes in freshwater inputs and ocean storage occurred in conjunction with the amplifying North Atlantic Oscillation and rising air temperatures. Fresh water may now be accumulating in the Arctic Ocean and will likely be exported southward if and when the North Atlantic Oscillation enters into a new high phase.     

Mid-depth circulation of the subpolar north atlantic during the last glacial maximum

Holocene and glacial carbon isotope data of benthic foraminifera from shallow to mid-depth cores from the northeastern subpolar Atlantic show that this region was strongly stratified, with carbon-13-enriched glacial North Atlantic intermediate water (GNAIW) overlying carbon-13-depleted Southern Ocean water (SOW). The data suggest that GNAIW originated north of the polar front and define GNAIW end-member carbon isotope values for studies of water-mass mixing in the open Atlantic. Identical carbon isotope values in the core of GNAIW and below the subtropical thermocline are consistent with rapid cycling of GNAIW through the northern Atlantic. The high carbon isotope values below the thermocline indicate that enhanced nutrient leakage in response to increased ventilation may have extended into intermediate waters. Geochemical box models show that the atmospheric carbon dioxide response to nutrient leakage that results from an increase in ventilation rate may be greater than the response to nutrient redistribution by conversion of North Atlantic deep water into GNAIW. These results underscore the potential rule of Atlantic Ocean circulation changes in influencing past atmospheric carbon dioxide values.     

Instability of glacial climate in a model of the ocean- atmosphere-cryosphere system

In contrast to the relatively stable climate of the past 10,000 years, during glacial times the North Atlantic region experienced large-amplitude transitions between cold (stadial) and warm (interstadial) states. In this modeling study, we demonstrate that hydrological interactions between the Atlantic thermohaline circulation (THC) and adjacent continental ice sheets can trigger abrupt warming events and also limit the lifetime of the interstadial circulation mode. These interactions have the potential to destabilize the THC, which is already more sensitive for glacial conditions than for the present-day climate, thus providing an explanation for the increased variability of glacial climate.     

Quaternary deepwater paleoceanography

During the past decade, geochemical paleoceanographers have begun to explore the changes in the circulation of the deep ocean that occurred during the glacial-interglacial cycles of the earth's recent history. The deep ocean was significantly colder during the glacial maximum. The distributions of biologically utilized elements (such as carbon and phosphorus) were significantly different as well; higher concentrations of these elements occurred in the deep (>2500 meters depth) North Atlantic, and lower concentrations occurred in the upper (<2500 meters depth) waters of the North Atlantic and possibly in all of the major ocean basins. In contrast, relatively subtle changes have been observed in the radiocarbon ages of deep waters. Slow deepwater changes are statistically linked to variations in the earth's orbit, but rapid changes in deepwater circulation also have occurred. Deepwater chemistry and circulation changes may control the variability in atmospheric CO(2) levels that have been documented from studies of air bubbles in polar ice cores.     

The history of South American tropical precipitation for the past 25,000 years

Long sediment cores recovered from the deep portions of Lake Titicaca are used to reconstruct the precipitation history of tropical South America for the past 25,000 years. Lake Titicaca was a deep, fresh, and continuously overflowing lake during the last glacial stage, from before 25,000 to 15,000 calibrated years before the present (cal yr B.P.), signifying that during the last glacial maximum (LGM), the Altiplano of Bolivia and Peru and much of the Amazon basin were wetter than today. The LGM in this part of the Andes is dated at 21,000 cal yr B.P., approximately coincident with the global LGM. Maximum aridity and lowest lake level occurred in the early and middle Holocene (8000 to 5500 cal yr B.P.) during a time of low summer insolation. Today, rising levels of Lake Titicaca and wet conditions in Amazonia are correlated with anomalously cold sea-surface temperatures in the northern equatorial Atlantic. Likewise, during the deglacial and Holocene periods, there were several millennial-scale wet phases on the Altiplano and in Amazonia that coincided with anomalously cold periods in the equatorial and high-latitude North Atlantic, such as the Younger Dryas.     

The last glacial-Holocene transition in southern Chile

Warming at the last glacial termination in the North Atlantic region was interrupted by a period of renewed glacial activity during the Younger Dryas chronozone (YDC). The underlying mechanism of this cooling remains elusive, but hypotheses turn on whether it was a global or a North Atlantic phenomenon. Chronological, sedimentological, and palaeoecological records from sediments of small lakes in oceanic southern Chile demonstrate that there was no YDC cooling in southern Chile. It is therefore likely that there was little or no cooling in southern Pacific surface waters and hence that YDC cooling in the North Atlantic was a regional, rather than global, phenomenon.     

Deep-Sea coral evidence for rapid change in ventilation of the deep north atlantic 15,400 years Ago

Coupled radiocarbon and thorium-230 dates from benthic coral species reveal that the ventilation rate of the North Atlantic upper deep water varied greatly during the last deglaciation. Radiocarbon ages in several corals of the same age, 15.41 +/- 0.17 thousand years, and nearly the same depth, 1800 meters, in the western North Atlantic Ocean increased by as much as 670 years during the 30- to 160-year life spans of the samples. Cadmium/calcium ratios in one coral imply that the nutrient content of these deep waters also increased. Our data show that the deep ocean changed on decadal-centennial time scales during rapid changes in the surface ocean and the atmosphere.     

Synchronous climate changes in antarctica and the north atlantic

Central Greenland ice cores provide evidence of abrupt changes in climate over the past 100,000 years. Many of these changes have also been identified in sedimentary and geochemical signatures in deep-sea sediment cores from the North Atlantic, confirming the link between millennial-scale climate variability and ocean thermohaline circulation. It is shown here that two of the most prominent North Atlantic events-the rapid warming that marks the end of the last glacial period and the Bolling/Allerod-Younger Dryas oscillation-are also recorded in an ice core from Taylor Dome, in the western Ross Sea sector of Antarctica. This result contrasts with evidence from ice cores in other regions of Antarctica, which show an asynchronous response between the Northern and Southern Hemispheres.     

Radiocarbon variability in the western North Atlantic during the last deglaciation

We present a detailed history of glacial to Holocene radiocarbon in the deep western North Atlantic from deep-sea corals and paired benthic-planktonic foraminifera. The deglaciation is marked by switches between radiocarbon-enriched and -depleted waters, leading to large radiocarbon gradients in the water column. These changes played an important role in modulating atmospheric radiocarbon. The deep-ocean record supports the notion of a bipolar seesaw with increased Northern-source deep-water formation linked to Northern Hemisphere warming and the reverse. In contrast, the more frequent radiocarbon variations in the intermediate/deep ocean are associated with roughly synchronous changes at the poles.     

Pore Fluid Constraints on the Temperature and Oxygen Isotopic Composition of the Glacial Ocean

Pore fluids from the upper 60 meters of sediment 3000 meters below the surface of the tropical Atlantic indicate that the oxygen isotopic composition (delta18O) of seawater at this site during the last glacial maximum was 0.8 ± 0.1 per mil higher than it is today. Combined with the delta18O change in benthic foraminifera from this region, the elevated ratio indicates that the temperature of deep water in the tropical Atlantic Ocean was 4°C colder during the last glacial maximum. Extrapolation from this site to a global average suggests that the ice volume contribution to the change in delta18O of foraminifera is 1.0 per mil, which partially reconciles the foraminiferal oxygen isotope record of tropical sea surface temperatures with estimates from Barbados corals and terrestrial climate proxies.     

Anthropogenic chlorofluoromethanes in the greenland and norwegian seas

The concentrations of two industrially produced chlorofluoromethanes, CCl(3)F(F-11) and CCl(2)F(2)(F-12), have been measured in the water column and in the marine atmosphere of the Greenland and Norwegian seas. Measurable concentrations of these two chlorofluoromethanes have penetrated to the deep basins of both of these regions, and the general characteristics of their vertical distributions are similar to those of the bomb-produced radioisotopes injected into the atmosphere on a similar time scale. The data have been fitted to a time-dependent box model based on deep convective mixing in the Greenland Sea and lateral exchange between the deep basins. The model calculations for the two chlorofluoromethanes in the Greenland Sea give similar results, with a time scale for deep convection of about 40 years. The time scale for lateral mixing between the deep Greenland Sea and the deep Norwegian Sea is estimated to be 20 to 30 years, although the agreement between the calculations for the two chlorofluoromethanes is limited by analytical uncertainties at the low concentrations found in the deep Norwegian Sea and by uncertainties in the model assumptions.     

Coccoliths as paleoclimatic indicators of pleistocene glaciation

Selected species of Coccolithophoridae from recent sediments and mid-Wisconsin glacial sediments of the North Atlantic were examined in an attempt to determine cooling effects. All species showed a definite shift southward during the glacial period. The average shift in this planktonic population was 15 degrees of latitude, with the greatest change in the eastern Atlantic. A paleoisotherm map can be drawn on the basis of the temperature boundaries of coccolithophorids. The species boundaries indicate a possible shift in position of the subtropical gyral to a glacial position roughly parallel to the 33-degree line of latitude.     

Atlantic water flow pathways revealed by lead contamination in Arctic basin sediments

Contaminant lead in sediments underlying boundary currents in the Arctic Ocean provides an image of current organization and stability during the past 50 years. The sediment distributions of lead, stable lead isotope ratios, and lead-210 in the major Arctic Ocean basins reveal close coupling of the Eurasian Basin with the North Atlantic during the 20th century. They indicate that the Atlantic water boundary current in the Eurasian Basin has been a prominent pathway, that contaminant lead from the Laptev Sea supplies surface water in the transpolar drift, and that the Canadian and Eurasian basins have been historically decoupled.     

The cause of carbon isotope minimum events on glacial terminations

The occurrence of carbon isotope minima at the beginning of glacial terminations is a common feature of planktic foraminifera carbon isotopic records from the Indo-Pacific, sub-Antarctic, and South Atlantic. We use the delta13C record of a thermocline-dwelling foraminifera, Neogloboquadrina dutertrei, and surface temperature estimates from the eastern equatorial Pacific to demonstrate that the onset of delta13C minimum events and the initiation of Southern Ocean warming occurred simultaneously. Timing agreement between the marine record and the delta13C minimum in an Antarctic atmospheric record suggests that the deglacial events were a response to the breakdown of surface water stratification, renewed Circumpolar Deep Water upwelling, and advection of low delta13C waters to the convergence zone at the sub-Antarctic front. On the basis of age agreement between the absolute delta13C minimum in surface records and the shift from low to high delta13C in the deep South Atlantic, we suggest that the delta13C rise that marks the end of the carbon isotope minima was due to the resumption of North Atlantic Deep Water influence in the Southern Ocean.     

The deep ocean during the last interglacial period

Oxygen isotope analysis of benthic foraminifera in deep sea cores from the Atlantic and Southern Oceans shows that during the last interglacial period, North Atlantic Deep Water (NADW) was 0.4 degrees +/- 0.2 degrees C warmer than today, whereas Antarctic Bottom Water temperatures were unchanged. Model simulations show that this distribution of deep water temperatures can be explained as a response of the ocean to forcing by high-latitude insolation. The warming of NADW was transferred to the Circumpolar Deep Water, providing additional heat around Antarctica, which may have been responsible for partial melting of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet.     

Mixed-layer deepening during Heinrich events: a multi-planktonic foraminiferal delta18O approach

Proxies from Greenland ice cores and North Atlantic marine sediment cores document repeated extreme climate swings of a few decades to millennia during the last glacial cycle, including periods of intense ice rafting called Heinrich events (HEs). We have found similar oxygen isotope variations recorded in mixed-layer-and thermocline-dwelling planktonic foraminifera during HEs 0, 1, and 4, suggesting that three foraminiferal taxa calcified their shells at similar temperatures in a homogenized upperwater column. This implies that the surface mixed layer was deeper during HEs. Similar deepening occurred on the northern margin of the ice-rafted-debris belt, implying that these deep mixed layers during HEs were widespread in the region. We suggest that an increase in storminess during HEs intensified the vertical mixing of meltwater from ice rafting in the upper ocean.     

Polychlorobiphenyls in North Atlantic ocean water

Concentrations of polychlorobiphenyls (PCB's) have been measured at the surface and at various depths in the water of the North Atlantic Ocean between 26 degrees N and 63 degrees N. The concentrations average about 20 parts per trillion and amount to an estimated 2 x 10(4) metric tons of PCB's in the upper 200 meters of water. The average concentrations of PCB's in the surface water of the Sargasso Sea are lower than those in the northern North Atlantic.