Editor's Summary

30 November 2006

A cold wind from the ocean

The Gulf Stream plays a key role in the climate system by importing vast quantities of heat and salt into the North Atlantic, and the possibility of changes in this flow is one of the main uncertainties hampering predictions of future climate change. Since instrumental records cover only the past 50 years, our knowledge of Gulf Stream behaviour on long timescales relies largely on geological records of past changes. Now an analysis of sediment cores from the Florida Straits, where the Gulf Stream enters the North Atlantic, has been used to reconstruct a record of the past 1,000 years. The results suggest that the Gulf Stream was weakened during the Little Ice Age (AD 1200–1850), a time of unusually cold conditions in the North Atlantic region, particularly Europe, implying that changes in Atlantic Ocean circulation had an impact on climate during historical times.

Letter: Gulf Stream density structure and transport during the past millennium

David C. Lund, Jean Lynch-Stieglitz and William B. Curry

doi:10.1038/nature05277

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