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Nature 409, 147-148 (11 January 2001) | doi:10.1038/35051691

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Climatology: Glacial hiccups

Didier Paillard

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The climate instability of glacial times probably resulted from abrupt switches in ocean circulation. A computer-model simulation provides the first glimpse of the dynamics involved.

Twenty years ago, climate was thought to have remained generally stable, at least for the past few millions of years. The belief was that the ocean and the atmosphere adjusted slowly to stately variations in ice-sheet extent during glacial–interglacial cycles.