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Elevated Southern Hemisphere moisture availability during glacial periods
Contrary to expectations from pollen and dust records, Southern Hemisphere subtropical regions experienced the greatest climatic moisture during glacial periods of the Late Pleistocene, which may not have been an obstacle to movement and expansion of animals and plants.
- Rieneke Weij
- , J. M. Kale Sniderman
- & Jay Gordon
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Article
| Open Access
The demise of the giant ape Gigantopithecus blacki
A multiproxy record of Gigantopithecus blacki provides insights into the ecological context of this species, which became extinct around 250,000 years ago, when increased seasonality led to a change in forest cover.
- Yingqi Zhang
- , Kira E. Westaway
- & Renaud Joannes-Boyau
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| Open Access
Evidence for the earliest structural use of wood at least 476,000 years ago
Wooden artefacts from waterlogged deposits in Zambia dating back 477 ka indicate hitherto unknown sophistication in woodworking at an early date.
- L. Barham
- , G. A. T. Duller
- & P. Nkombwe
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Forced changes in the Pacific Walker circulation over the past millennium
Analysis of a new annually resolved, multi-method, palaeoproxy-derived reconstruction ensemble for the period 1200–2000 suggests that recent variability in the Pacific Walker circulation is unusual but not unprecedented over the past 800 years.
- Georgina Falster
- , Bronwen Konecky
- & Samantha Stevenson
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Reversed Holocene temperature–moisture relationship in the Horn of Africa
Climate-proxy data indicate that during the last glacial period in the Horn of Africa higher temperatures were associated with greater moisture availability, whereas during the current interglacial period, as well as historically, higher temperatures have been associated with increased drought.
- A. J. Baxter
- , D. Verschuren
- & J. S. Sinninghe Damsté
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Matters Arising |
Reply to: Possible magmatic CO2 influence on the Laacher See eruption date
- Frederick Reinig
- , Lukas Wacker
- & Ulf Büntgen
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Matters Arising |
Possible magmatic CO2 influence on the Laacher See eruption date
- James U. L. Baldini
- , Richard J. Brown
- & Lisa M. Baldini
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A well-oxygenated eastern tropical Pacific during the warm Miocene
Analysis of palaeoceanographic proxies sensitive to oxygen-deficient zone extent and intensity show that the eastern tropical Pacific was well oxygenated during the warm Miocene, agreeing with model simulations that suggest that the recent deoxygenation trend may eventually reverse.
- Anya V. Hess
- , Alexandra Auderset
- & Alfredo Martínez-García
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Indian Ocean salinity build-up primes deglacial ocean circulation recovery
Salinity reconstructions show that Indian Ocean surface salinity increased during glacial periods and that the release of this water via the Agulhas Leakage during deglaciation can trigger abrupt changes in the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation.
- Sophie Nuber
- , James W. B. Rae
- & Stephen Barker
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Bipolar impact and phasing of Heinrich-type climate variability
Ice-core data show that extreme iceberg discharge events in the North Atlantic had no detectable impact on Greenland temperatures but are synchronous with abrupt acceleration of Antarctic warming.
- Kaden C. Martin
- , Christo Buizert
- & Todd A. Sowers
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Lunar eclipses illuminate timing and climate impact of medieval volcanism
Analysis of contemporary reports of total lunar eclipses, combined with aerosol model simulations and tree-ring-based climate proxies, allowed greater precision in dating of the occurrence of stratospheric volcanic eruptions during the High Medieval Period.
- Sébastien Guillet
- , Christophe Corona
- & Markus Stoffel
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Review Article |
Revisiting the Holocene global temperature conundrum
Examination of available evidence on whether anthropogenic global warming was preceded by a long-term warming trend or by global cooling provides support for a relatively mild millennial-scale global thermal maximum during the mid-Holocene.
- Darrell S. Kaufman
- & Ellie Broadman
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Severe multi-year drought coincident with Hittite collapse around 1198–1196 bc
Tree-ring analysis is correlated with stable isotope data and historical texts to identify an unusual multi-year period of drought from around 1198 to 1196 bc associated with the collapse of the Hittite Empire.
- Sturt W. Manning
- , Cindy Kocik
- & Jed P. Sparks
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Article
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Modern temperatures in central–north Greenland warmest in past millennium
A reconstruction of temperatures in central and north Greenland from ad 1000 to 2011 shows that that the final decade of this period was on average 1.5 ± 0.4 °C warmer compared to pre-industrial temperatures, accompanied by increased meltwater run-off.
- M. Hörhold
- , T. Münch
- & T. Laepple
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Seasonal temperatures in West Antarctica during the Holocene
Analysis of a continuous record of water-isotope ratios from the West Antarctic Ice Sheet Divide ice core reveals a dominant role for annual maximum insolation in determining West Antarctic summer temperature during the Holocene.
- Tyler R. Jones
- , Kurt M. Cuffey
- & James W. C. White
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Deglacial increase of seasonal temperature variability in the tropical ocean
Mass spectrometry imaging of long-chain alkenones in sediments from the Cariaco Basin shows that average temperatures remained stable during the Younger Dryas to Holocene transition but seasonality more than doubled and interannual variability intensified.
- Lars Wörmer
- , Jenny Wendt
- & Kai-Uwe Hinrichs
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Two annual cycles of the Pacific cold tongue under orbital precession
The Pacific cold tongue is shown to possess two distinct annual cycles with complex interference effects, calling for a reassessment of its seasonal dynamics and re-evaluation of tropical Pacific palaeoclimate records of annual cycle phase changes.
- John C. H. Chiang
- , Alyssa R. Atwood
- & Anthony J. Broccoli
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Hydroclimatic vulnerability of peat carbon in the central Congo Basin
Between around 5,000 to 2,000 years ago, a drying climate in the vast peatlands of the Congo Basin triggered peat decomposition and carbon release to the atmosphere, implying that this region may be vulnerable to future climate change.
- Yannick Garcin
- , Enno Schefuß
- & Simon L. Lewis
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Warm pool ocean heat content regulates ocean–continent moisture transport
Geochemical proxies from 360,000-year-old sediment cores and numerical simulations are used to show that the upper ocean heat content of the Indo-Pacific Warm Pool greatly affects the Asian monsoon hydroclimate.
- Zhimin Jian
- , Yue Wang
- & Xingxing Wang
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Africa’s oldest dinosaurs reveal early suppression of dinosaur distribution
A new Triassic dinosaur assemblage from Zimbabwe reveals that the earliest dinosaurs were confined to a temperate region in the far south of Pangaea.
- Christopher T. Griffin
- , Brenen M. Wynd
- & Hazel R. Taruvinga
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Enhanced ocean oxygenation during Cenozoic warm periods
By using foraminifera-bound nitrogen isotopes, it is shown that, during two warm periods of the Cenozoic, oxygen-deficient zones contracted rather than expanded, suggesting that global warming may not necessarily lead to increased oceanic anoxia.
- Alexandra Auderset
- , Simone Moretti
- & Alfredo Martínez-García
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Continental configuration controls ocean oxygenation during the Phanerozoic
Analysis of a series of Earth system model experiments shows that continental rearrangement during the Phanerozoic had a marked influence on variations in ocean oxygenation, independent of atmospheric pO2.
- Alexandre Pohl
- , Andy Ridgwell
- & Christopher R. Scotese
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Matters Arising |
Concerns of assuming linearity in the reconstruction of thermal maxima
- T. Laepple
- , J. Shakun
- & S. Marcott
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Matters Arising |
Reply to: Concerns of assuming linearity in the reconstruction of thermal maxima
- Samantha Bova
- , Yair Rosenthal
- & Weipeng Zheng
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Article
| Open Access
700,000 years of tropical Andean glaciation
Analysis of a continuous and independently dated record of glaciation in the tropical Andes spanning 700,000 years shows that Andean glaciation follows patterns of global ice volume change, with a periodicity of approximately 100,000 years.
- D. T. Rodbell
- , R. G. Hatfield
- & S. Pierdominici
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Life rather than climate influences diversity at scales greater than 40 million years
- Andrej Spiridonov
- & Shaun Lovejoy
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Review Article |
Evolution of Earth’s tectonic carbon conveyor belt
Oceanic plate carbon reservoirs are reconstructed and the fate of subducted carbon is tracked using thermodynamic modelling, challenging previous views and providing boundary conditions for future carbon cycle models.
- R. Dietmar Müller
- , Ben Mather
- & Sabin Zahirovic
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Climate effects on archaic human habitats and species successions
A new model simulation of climate change during the past 2 million years indicates that the appearances and disappearances of hominin species correlate with long-term climatic anomalies.
- Axel Timmermann
- , Kyung-Sook Yun
- & Andrey Ganopolski
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Matters Arising |
No freshwater-filled glacial Arctic Ocean
- Robert F. Spielhagen
- , Jan C. Scholten
- & Anton Eisenhauer
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Matters Arising |
Reply to: No freshwater-filled glacial Arctic Ocean
- Walter Geibert
- , Jens Matthiessen
- & Ruediger Stein
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Article
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Ostrich eggshell beads reveal 50,000-year-old social network in Africa
By tracing the changing size of ostrich eggshell beads, climate is shown to have an important role in influencing when and where regional African populations interacted.
- Jennifer M. Miller
- & Yiming V. Wang
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A large West Antarctic Ice Sheet explains early Neogene sea-level amplitude
Variations in Miocene sea level can be explained by a large marine-based West Antarctic Ice Sheet.
- J. W. Marschalek
- , L. Zurli
- & Zhifang Xiong
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Matters Arising |
Non-trivial role of internal climate feedback on interglacial temperature evolution
- Xu Zhang
- & Fahu Chen
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Matters Arising |
Reply to: Non-trivial role of internal climate feedback on interglacial temperature evolution
- Samantha Bova
- , Yair Rosenthal
- & Cheng Zeng
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Article |
Globally resolved surface temperatures since the Last Glacial Maximum
Paleoclimate datasets are integrated with a climate model to reconstruct global surface temperature since the Last Glacial Maximum, showing sustained warming until the mid-Holocene.
- Matthew B. Osman
- , Jessica E. Tierney
- & Christopher J. Poulsen
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Indo-Pacific Walker circulation drove Pleistocene African aridification
A record of flow-speed variations from an ocean core shows that a key component of Indian Ocean circulation rapidly accelerated 2.1 million years ago, coincident with intensification of Pacific Walker circulation.
- H. J. L. van der Lubbe
- , I. R. Hall
- & J. C. A. Joordens
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Pliocene decoupling of equatorial Pacific temperature and pH gradients
New proxy data for ocean pH and an ocean–atmosphere model show that a radically different ocean circulation led to decoupling of ocean productivity and upwelling in the equatorial Pacific Ocean 3–6 million years ago.
- Madison G. Shankle
- , Natalie J. Burls
- & Pincelli M. Hull
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Day–night cloud asymmetry prevents early oceans on Venus but not on Earth
Global climate model simulations of early Venus and Earth show that differences in the cloud regimes prevented ocean formation on Venus but not on Earth.
- Martin Turbet
- , Emeline Bolmont
- & Emmanuel Marcq
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Hemispheric black carbon increase after the 13th-century Māori arrival in New Zealand
Antarctic ice-core records and atmospheric transport modelling used here show that the 13th-century rise of Māori culture in New Zealand led to a threefold increase of atmospheric black carbon.
- Joseph R. McConnell
- , Nathan J. Chellman
- & Alberto J. Aristarain
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A lithium-isotope perspective on the evolution of carbon and silicon cycles
Analysis of shallow-water marine carbonate samples from 101 stratigraphic units allows construction of a record of lithium isotopes from the past 3 billion years, tracking the evolution of the global carbon and silicon cycles.
- Boriana Kalderon-Asael
- , Joachim A. R. Katchinoff
- & Philip A. E. Pogge von Strandmann
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Precise date for the Laacher See eruption synchronizes the Younger Dryas
A revised date for the Laacher See eruption using measurements of subfossil trees shifts the chronology of European varved lakes relative to the Greenland ice core record, synchronizing the onset of the Younger Dryas across the North Atlantic–European sector.
- Frederick Reinig
- , Lukas Wacker
- & Ulf Büntgen
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Matters Arising |
Clusters of flowstone ages are not supported by statistical evidence
- Philip Hopley
- , Pieter Vermeesch
- & Alfred Latham
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Widespread six degrees Celsius cooling on land during the Last Glacial Maximum
Analyses and modelling of noble gases in groundwater show that the mean annual surface temperatures of low-altitude, low-to-mid-latitude land masses were about 6 °C cooler during the Last Glacial Maximum than during the Late Holocene.
- Alan M. Seltzer
- , Jessica Ng
- & Martin Stute
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Review Article |
Towards a rigorous understanding of societal responses to climate change
This Review proposes an interdisciplinary framework for researching climate–society interactions that focuses on the mechanisms through which climate change has influenced societies, and the uncertainties of discerning this influence across different spatiotemporal scales.
- Dagomar Degroot
- , Kevin Anchukaitis
- & Natale Zappia
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Seasonal origin of the thermal maxima at the Holocene and the last interglacial
Reanalysis of Holocene sea surface temperature records affirms the role of retreating ice and rising greenhouse gases in driving a steady increase in global temperatures over the past 12,000 years.
- Samantha Bova
- , Yair Rosenthal
- & Mi Yan
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Antarctic icebergs reorganize ocean circulation during Pleistocene glacials
Iceberg-trajectory models along with multi-proxy evidence from sediment cores from the Indian Ocean show that northward shifts in Antarctic iceberg melt redistributed freshwater in the Southern Ocean during the Pleistocene.
- Aidan Starr
- , Ian R. Hall
- & Hucai Zhang
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Poleward and weakened westerlies during Pliocene warmth
Analysis of dust from marine sediments in the North Pacific shows that warm periods during the Pliocene witnessed weaker and more poleward westerlies than during subsequent glacial periods.
- Jordan T. Abell
- , Gisela Winckler
- & Timothy D. Herbert
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Antarctic ice dynamics amplified by Northern Hemisphere sea-level forcing
Changes in Northern Hemisphere ice-sheet size during ice-age cycles enhance the advance and retreat of the grounding line of the Antarctic Ice Sheet, owing to interhemispheric sea-level forcing.
- Natalya Gomez
- , Michael E. Weber
- & Holly K. Han
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Rate of mass loss from the Greenland Ice Sheet will exceed Holocene values this century
Rates of ice-mass loss from southwestern Greenland this century will exceed the maximum rate over the past 12,000 years, and would not be the result of natural variation.
- Jason P. Briner
- , Joshua K. Cuzzone
- & Sophie Nowicki
Five million years of Antarctic Circumpolar Current strength variability