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African vegetation controlled by tropical sea surface temperatures in the mid-Pleistocene period

Nature volume 422, pages 418–421 (2003)Cite this article

Abstract

The dominant forcing factors for past large-scale changes in vegetation are widely debated. Changes in the distribution of C4 plants—adapted to warm, dry conditions and low atmospheric CO2 concentrations1—have been attributed to marked changes in environmental conditions, but the relative impacts of changes in aridity, temperature2,3 and CO2 concentration4,5 are not well understood. Here, we present a record of African C4 plant abundance between 1.2 and 0.45 million years ago, derived from compound-specific carbon isotope analyses of wind-transported terrigenous plant waxes. We find that large-scale changes in African vegetation are linked closely to sea surface temperatures in the tropical Atlantic Ocean. We conclude that, in the mid-Pleistocene, changes in atmospheric moisture content—driven by tropical sea surface temperature changes and the strength of the African monsoon—controlled aridity on the African continent, and hence large-scale vegetation changes.

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Figure 1: Modern distributions of plant wax concentrations and their vegetation signatures.
Figure 2: Present-day atmospheric circulation over Africa, vegetation zones and dust plumes.
Figure 3: Mid-Pleistocene changes of African vegetation, tropical Atlantic SST, eolian plant wax transport and global ice volume.

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Acknowledgements

We thank the Ocean Drilling Program for providing samples. The investigations were supported by the Research Council for Earth and Life Sciences with financial aid from the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research.

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Author notes

  1. Enno Schefuß

    Present address: Research Center Ocean Margins, University of Bremen, PO Box 330440, 28334, Bremen, Germany

  2. Enno Schefuß: Correspondence and requests for materials should be addressed to E.S.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research (NIOZ), PO Box 59, 1790 AB, Den Burg, The Netherlands

    Stefan Schouten, J. H. Fred Jansen & Jaap S. Sinninghe Damsté

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  1. Enno Schefuß
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Correspondence to Enno Schefuß.

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Schefuß, E., Schouten, S., Jansen, J. et al. African vegetation controlled by tropical sea surface temperatures in the mid-Pleistocene period. Nature 422, 418–421 (2003). https://doi.org/10.1038/nature01500

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