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Palaeoclimate

Foreshadowing the glacial era

Nature volume 436, pages 333–334 (2005)Cite this article

Under what circumstances do glaciations persist or occur only transiently? Indications that short-lived ‘icehouse’ conditions occurred during the otherwise warm Eocene provide further cause for debate on the question.

Earth entered its present glacial state 34 million years ago with the growth of the Antarctic ice sheet1. This major climate transition occurred abruptly and essentially irreversibly at the Eocene–Oligocene boundary, a conclusion based on the record of ice-sheet size preserved in the oxygen isotopic composition of limestones2,3. The preceding Eocene epoch (55–34 million years ago) is generally considered to have been warm and ice-free, but data on this time interval, as recorded in cores of marine sediments, have been sparse.

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Figure 1: Glacial stability and instability.

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  1. Department of Geosciences, Pennsylvania State University, 535 Deike Building, University Park, 16802, Pennsylvania, USA

    Lee R. Kump

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  1. Lee R. Kump
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Kump, L. Foreshadowing the glacial era. Nature 436, 333–334 (2005). https://doi.org/10.1038/436333a

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