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Mid-Pliocene climate change amplified by a switch in Indonesian subsurface throughflow

Nature Geoscience volume 2, pages 434–438 (2009)Cite this article

Abstract

The tectonically driven closure of tropical seaways during the Pliocene epoch (∼5–2 million years (Myr) ago) altered ocean circulation and affected the evolution of climate. Plate tectonic reconstructions show that the main reorganization of one such seaway, the Indonesian Gateway, occurred between 4 and 3 Myr ago. Model simulations have suggested that this would have triggered a switch in the source of waters feeding the Indonesian throughflow into the Indian Ocean, from the warm salty waters of the South Pacific Ocean to the cool and relatively fresh waters of the North Pacific Ocean. Here we use paired measurements of the δ18O and Mg/Ca ratios of planktonic foraminifera to reconstruct the thermal structure of the eastern tropical Indian Ocean from 5.5 to 2 Myr ago. We find that sea surface conditions remained relatively stable throughout the interval, whereas subsurface waters freshened and cooled by about 4 ∘C between 3.5 and 2.95 Myr ago. We suggest that the restriction of the Indonesian Gateway led to the cooling and shoaling of the thermocline in the tropical Indian Ocean. We conclude that this tectonic reorganization contributed to the global shoaling of the thermocline recorded during the Pliocene epoch, possibly contributing to the development of the equatorial eastern Pacific cold tongue.

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Figure 1: Annual ocean temperatures and salinities at (sub)surface levels.
Figure 2: Pliocene proxy records from Site 214 and Site 806.
Figure 3: Pliocene (sub)surface changes in the tropical eastern Indian Ocean in relation to other ocean areas.

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Acknowledgements

Samples for this study were provided by the IODP. Financial support for this research was provided by the German Science Foundation (DFG) within project Nu60/17-1. We thank J. Etourneau, S. Steph, D. Garbe-Schönberg, J. Groeneveld, M. Regenberg, N. Gehre and K. Kiesling for valuable comments and technical support. K.M. was supported by an IIT Kharagpur fellowship.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Leibniz Institute of Marine Sciences (IFM-GEOMAR), University of Kiel, Wischhofstrasse 1–3, D-24148 Kiel, Germany

    Cyrus Karas & Dirk Nürnberg

  2. Department of Geology & Geophysics, Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur 721302, India

    Anil K. Gupta & Kuppusamy Mohan

  3. Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research, Am Alten Hafen 26, D-27568 Bremerhaven, Germany

    Ralf Tiedemann

  4. Zentrum für Marine Umweltwissenschaften, Universität Bremen, D-28334 Bremen, Germany

    Torsten Bickert

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Correspondence to Cyrus Karas.

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Karas, C., Nürnberg, D., Gupta, A. et al. Mid-Pliocene climate change amplified by a switch in Indonesian subsurface throughflow. Nature Geosci 2, 434–438 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1038/ngeo520

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