Abstract
THE prospect of global warming has focused attention on the role of palaeoecology in testing the accuracy and sensitivity of climate-model predictions, in identifying past analogues for future climate change, and in placing model-predicted climate responses in the context of natural climate variability1,2. Proxy data for climate reconstruction can be derived from many sources, including the palaeolimnological record3,4. In closed-basin lakes in arid and semi-arid regions, shifts in effective moisture lead to the concentration or dilution of dissolved salts, and these changes in salinity are clearly reflected in the composition of lacustrine diatom assemblages5–8. Here we refine a previously published9 diatom-based transfer function for the reconstruction of past changes in salinity of lakes in the northern Great Plains region of North America, and apply the refined transfer function to a late-glacial and Holocene sediment record from Devils Lake, North Dakota. Our results show that there were a number of alternations between fresh and saline conditions during the Holocene and hence demonstrate the utility of the technique in reconstructing past changes in regional climate.
This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution
Access options
Subscribe to this journal
Receive 51 print issues and online access
$199.00 per year
only $3.90 per issue
Buy this article
- Purchase on Springer Link
- Instant access to full article PDF
Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout
Similar content being viewed by others
References
COHMAP Members Science 241, 1043–1052 (1988).
Glantz, M. H. & Ausubel, J. J. in Societal Responses to Regional Climatic Change (ed. Glantz, M. H.) 113–142 (Westview, Boulder, Colorado, 1988).
Harrison, S. P. Clim. Dyn. 3, 157–167 (1989).
Kutzbach, J. E. & Street-Perrott, F. A. Nature 317, 130–134 (1985).
Fritz, S. C. & Battarbee, R. W. in Proc. 9th Int. Diatom Symp. 265–271 (Cramer, Stuttgart, 1988).
Bradbury, J. P., Forester, R. M. & Thompson, R. S. J. Paleolimnol. 1, 249–267 (1989).
Radle, N. J., Keister, C. M. & Battarbee, R. W. J. Paleolimnol. 2, 159–172 (1989).
Gasse, F., Talling, J. F. & Kilham, P. Rev. Hydrobiol. Trop. 16, 3–34 (1983).
Fritz, S. C. Limnol. Oceanogr. 35, 1771–1781 (1990).
Battarbee, R. W. in Handbook of Holocene Palaeoecology and Palaeohydrology (ed. Berglund, B.) 527–570 (Wiley, New York, 1986).
ter Braak, C. J. F. Ecology 67, 1167–1179 (1986).
Jolliffe, I. T. Principal Component Analysis, 1–270 (Springer, New York, 1986).
Hill, M. O. & Gauch, H. G. Vegetatio 42, 47–58 (1980).
ter Braak, C. J. F. & VanDam, H. Hydrobiologia 178, 209–223 (1989).
Birks, H. J. B., Line, J. M., Juggins, S., Stevenson, A. C. & ter Braak, C. J. F. Phil. Trans. R. Soc. Lond. B327, 263–278 (1990).
ter Braak, C. J. F. CANOCO—A FORTRAN program for Canonical Community Ordination (TNO institute of Applied Computer Science, Wageningen, 1987).
Swenson, H. A. & Colby, B. R. US geol. Surv. Water-Supply Pap. 1–79 (1955).
Winter, T. C. in Northern Prairie Wetlands (ed. Van Der Valk, A.) 16–54 (Iowa State University Press, Ames, 1989).
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Fritz, S., Juggins, S., Battarbee, R. et al. Reconstruction of past changes in salinity and climate using a diatom-based transfer function. Nature 352, 706–708 (1991). https://doi.org/10.1038/352706a0
Received:
Accepted:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/352706a0
This article is cited by
-
Sedimentary DNA for tracking the long-term changes in biodiversity
Environmental Science and Pollution Research (2023)
-
A diatom-based predictive model for inferring past conductivity in Chadian Sahara lakes
Journal of Paleolimnology (2023)
-
A new salinity index for the invertebrate fauna of Australian inland waters
Hydrobiologia (2023)
-
Diatom community response to inland water salinization: a review
Hydrobiologia (2023)
-
A diatom-inferred water-depth transfer function from a single lake in the northern California Coast Range
Journal of Paleolimnology (2023)
Comments
By submitting a comment you agree to abide by our Terms and Community Guidelines. If you find something abusive or that does not comply with our terms or guidelines please flag it as inappropriate.