Palaeoclimate articles within Nature Communications

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  • Article
    | Open Access

    Ice loss from the Amundsen Sea sector of West Antarctica is rapidly accelerating. Here, the authors reveal that this region also underwent thinning and retreat from 9 to 6 thousand years ago, due to atmospheric connections with a warming tropical Pacific.

    • Adam D. Sproson
    • , Yusuke Yokoyama
    •  & Rebecca L. Totten

  • Article
    | Open Access

    A cold season climate reconstruction for the northern midlatitudes based on freezing and thawing dates of rivers shows a cold spell 1808/9-1815/6 affecting Eurasia. In addition to two volcanic eruptions, increased snow cover played an important role.

    • Lukas Reichen
    • , Angela-Maria Burgdorf
    •  & This Rutishauser

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The Cambrian is the most poorly dated period of the past 541 million years. Here, the authors present a new astronomical time scale, allowing for a first assessment, in numerical time, of the evolution of major biotic and abiotic changes that characterized the late Cambrian Earth.

    • Zhengfu Zhao
    • , Nicolas R. Thibault
    •  & Arne T. Nielsen

  • Article
    | Open Access

    In contrast to future projections, paleoclimate records often find wetter subtropics in tandem with elevated CO2. Here, a compilation of proxies and simulations are used to reveal the climate dynamics and feedbacks responsible for generating wet subtropics during the mid-Pliocene.

    • Ran Feng
    • , Tripti Bhattacharya
    •  & W. Richard Peltier

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Sea-level rise is a significant indicator of climate changes and it is important to identify the time of emergence of modern rates of sea-level rise. Here the authors estimate that global sea-level rise emerged by 1863 and find spatial variability of emergence at sites within the North Atlantic.

    • Jennifer S. Walker
    • , Robert E. Kopp
    •  & Benjamin P. Horton

  • Article
    | Open Access

    It has been argued that volcanic eruptions can influence the El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO), but the strength of this relationship is not well known. Here, the authors use paleoclimate data assimilation methods to study the linkage over the last millennium and find that there is only a weak association between volcanism and ENSO.

    • Feng Zhu
    • , Julien Emile-Geay
    •  & Jonathan King

  • Article
    | Open Access

    What caused the end of the high ocean productivity in the tropics in late Miocene-early Pliocene is debated. Here, deep-sea sediment records reveal that productivity abruptly declined 4.6 million years ago, potentially linked to reduced seasonality and monsoon intensity that led to decreased nutrient supply to the oceans.

    • B. – Th. Karatsolis
    • , B. C. Lougheed
    •  & J. Henderiks

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Iodine is important for new particle formation in the atmosphere, but how it varies over long time scales is not well known. Here, the authors present ice core data from the last 127,000 years that show that iodine varied between glacials and interglacials, but also showed abrupt changes in pace with sea-ice and temperatures.

    • Juan Pablo Corella
    • , Niccolo Maffezzoli
    •  & Alfonso Saiz-Lopez

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The role of Southern Ocean gateways contributing to the Eocene-Oligocene climate transition is still debated. Here, the authors present high-resolution ocean simulations to show that gateways opening led to a reorganization of ocean circulation, heat transport and Antarctic surface water cooling.

    • Isabel Sauermilch
    • , Joanne M. Whittaker
    •  & Joseph H. LaCasce

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The emplacement of the Karoo LIP occurred synchronously with the Toarcian crisis, which is characterized by negative carbon isotope excursions. Here the authors use carbon cycle modelling to show that thermogenic carbon released during LIP emplacement represents a plausible source for the negative excursions.

    • Thea H. Heimdal
    • , Yves Goddéris
    •  & Henrik H. Svensen

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Long-term variability of the North Pacific Subtropical Gyre (NPSG) circulation is not well understood. Here, the authors present data from different boundary currents that shows an enhanced NPSG circulation since ~3000-4000 years ago, linked to a southward migration of the Intertropical Convergence Zone.

    • Yancheng Zhang
    • , Xufeng Zheng
    •  & Zhonghui Liu

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Deglacial hydroclimate in South China is perennially debated. New modeling experiments reveal that regional hydroclimate was strongly influenced by rainfall during the transition between the East Asian summer monsoon and winter monsoon, forced by climate variability in the North Atlantic.

    • Chengfei He
    • , Zhengyu Liu
    •  & Yishuai Jin

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Modelling and sea surface temperature proxy data from the Weddell Sea document a 3–4 °C drop coinciding with the Early Cretaceous Weissert Event. Temperature data worldwide confirm a 3.0 °C global mean surface cooling, equivalent to a ~40% drop in atmospheric pCO2, favouring local polar ice.

    • Liyenne Cavalheiro
    • , Thomas Wagner
    •  & Elisabetta Erba

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The Paleocene–Eocene boundary coincided with runaway global warming possibly analogous to future climate change, but the sources of greenhouse gasses have remained unresolved. Here, the authors reveal volcanism triggered initial warming, and subsequent carbon was released after crossing a tipping point.

    • Sev Kender
    • , Kara Bogus
    •  & Melanie J. Leng

  • Article
    | Open Access

    It is still unclear when and by which route modern humans expanded out of Africa. Here, Beyer et al. use paleoclimate reconstructions and estimates of human precipitation requirements to evaluate the survivability of spatial and temporal migration corridors to Eurasia over the last 300,000 years.

    • Robert M. Beyer
    • , Mario Krapp
    •  & Andrea Manica

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The North Water polynya is a unique but vulnerable ecosystem, home to Indigenous people and Arctic keystone species. New palaeoecological records from Greenland suggest human abandonment c. 2200–1200 cal yrs BP occurred during climate-forced polynya instability, foreshadowing future ecosystem declines.

    • Sofia Ribeiro
    • , Audrey Limoges
    •  & Thomas A. Davidson

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Reconciling the Snowball Earth hypothesis with sedimentological cyclicity has been a persistent challenge. A new cyclostratigraphic climate record for a Cryogenian banded iron formation in Australia provides evidence for orbital forcing of ice sheet advance and retreat cycles during Snowball Earth.

    • Ross N. Mitchell
    • , Thomas M. Gernon
    •  & Xiaofang He

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The drivers of monsoon systems in the past are not well known. Here, the authors present a model-based reconstruction of the last 30 million years and show that the south east Asian monsoon evolution is dominated by orographic development while the strength of the Indian Summer monsoon is controlled by a combination of factors.

    • James R. Thomson
    • , Philip B. Holden
    •  & Nigel B. W. Harris

  • Article
    | Open Access

    How sea-level in the western Mediterranean reacts to climate changes is not well known. Here, the authors present a regional reconstruction and show that temperatures influenced sea-level change rates during the Holocene, while recent sea-level rise is happening faster than during any other period of the last 4000 years.

    • Matteo Vacchi
    • , Kristen M. Joyse
    •  & Alessio Rovere

  • Article
    | Open Access

    How the Antarctic Circumpolar Current (ACC) changed on glacial-interglacial time scales is not well known. Here, the authors present a 140,000 year long sediment record from the Drake passage and show both glacial-interglacial as well as millennial-scale variability which are linked to Atlantic variability and marine carbon storage.

    • Shuzhuang Wu
    • , Lester Lembke-Jene
    •  & Gerhard Kuhn

  • Article
    | Open Access

    “Earth degassing is a critical carbon source, but its contribution to Cenozoic atmospheric CO2 variations is not well known. Here, the authors analyse CO2 fluxes on the Tibetan Plateau and suggest that the India-Asia collision was the primary driver of changes in atmospheric CO2 over the past 65 Ma.”

    • Zhengfu Guo
    • , Marjorie Wilson
    •  & Jiaqi Liu

  • Article
    | Open Access

    There is a lot of uncertainty about what Earth’s climate and geography were like in the early Cambrian, when animal life diversified throughout the oceans. Here we show that numeric comparisons of model simulations and climatically influenced rocks can help constrain geography and climate during this time.

    • Thomas W. Wong Hearing
    • , Alexandre Pohl
    •  & Thijs R. A. Vandenbroucke

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Tree rings are a crucial archive for Common Era climate reconstructions, but the degree to which methodological decisions influence outcomes is not well known. Here, the authors show how different approaches taken by 15 different groups influence the ensemble temperature reconstruction from the same data.

    • Ulf Büntgen
    • , Kathy Allen
    •  & Jan Esper

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Earth-system sensitivity (ESS) describes the long-term temperature response for a given change in atmospheric CO2 and, as such, is a crucial parameter to assess future climate change. Here, the authors use a Bayesian model with data from the last 420 Myrs to reduce uncertainties and estimate ESS to be around 3.4 °C.

    • Tony E. Wong
    • , Ying Cui
    •  & Klaus Keller

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Long-term sedimentary ancient DNA (sedaDNA) records can help inform how biodiversity will likely respond to future climate change. Here, Liu et al. reconstruct plant diversity at the margin of the Tibetan Plateau over the last ~18,000 years using sedaDNA and use this record to predict future diversity change.

    • Sisi Liu
    • , Stefan Kruse
    •  & Ulrike Herzschuh

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Understanding the past is necessary to comprehend Earth’s response to present climate change, but past climate reconstruction is hampered by a lack of temperature proxies. Here the authors develop the HDI26, a proxy using cyanobacterial glycolipids to reconstruct water temperatures of lakes worldwide.

    • Thorsten Bauersachs
    • , James M. Russell
    •  & Lorenz Schwark

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The Permian–Triassic mass extinction was accompanied by a massive release of carbon into the ocean-atmosphere system, but the magnitude of change is not well known. Here, the authors present a new record of C3 plants from southwestern China which shows that atmospheric pCO2 increased by a factor of six during this event.

    • Yuyang Wu
    • , Daoliang Chu
    •  & Ying Cui

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Palaeodata resolution and dating limit the study of the sequence of changes across Earth during past abrupt warmings. Here, the authors show tight decadal-scale coupling between Greenland climate, North Atlantic sea ice and atmospheric circulation during these past events using two highly resolved ice-core records.

    • E. Capron
    • , S. O. Rasmussen
    •  & J. W. C. White

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Meltwater Pulse 1A was the most rapid global sea-level rise event during the last deglaciation, but the source of the freshwater causing this rise is debated. Here, the authors use a data-driven inversion approach to show that the North American and Eurasian Ice Sheets were the dominant contributors.

    • Yucheng Lin
    • , Fiona D. Hibbert
    •  & Sarah L. Bradley

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Sea-level rise is an important part of climate change, but most sea-level budgets are global and cannot capture important regional changes. Here the authors estimate sea-level budgets along the U.S. Atlantic coast, finding a faster rate of rise during the 20th century than any time in the past 2000 years.

    • Jennifer S. Walker
    • , Robert E. Kopp
    •  & Benjamin P. Horton

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The configuration of past ice sheets, and therefore sea level, is highly uncertain. Here, the authors provide a global reconstruction of ice sheets for the past 80,000 years that allows to test proxy based sea level reconstructions and helps to reconcile disagreements with sea level changes inferred from models.

    • Evan J. Gowan
    • , Xu Zhang
    •  & Gerrit Lohmann

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The expansion of oceanic anoxia during the Paleocene Eocene Thermal Maximum has important implications for faunal turnover patterns and global biogeochemical cycles. Here the authors use uranium isotopes and a biogeochemical model to suggest that the areal expansion of anoxia must have been limited to 10-fold.

    • Matthew O. Clarkson
    • , Timothy M. Lenton
    •  & Derek Vance

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Some algae produce compounds called alkenones that can reconstruct sea surface temperature through geological time, but in high latitudes unknown species complicate use of this proxy. Here the authors find a lineage of sea ice algae that produces alkenones and can be used as a paleo-sensor for sea ice abundance.

    • Karen Jiaxi Wang
    • , Yongsong Huang
    •  & Patricia Cabedo-Sanz

  • Article
    | Open Access

    A Southern Ocean influences on the carbon cycle is considered a key component of deglacial changes. Here, the authors show spatial differences in glacial Southern Ocean carbon storage that dissipated rapidly 14.6 kyr ago, revealing a South Indian Ocean contribution to rapid deglacial atmospheric CO2 increases.

    • Julia Gottschalk
    • , Elisabeth Michel
    •  & Samuel L. Jaccard

  • Article
    | Open Access

    This study investigates flood hazards of the Brahmaputra River, Bangladesh. Based on a tree ring reconstruction of seasonal river discharge, climate modelling, and historic documentation of flood events, the authors suggest flood hazard risk is underestimated by ~24–38% in the present day compared to the past 700 years.

    • Mukund P. Rao
    • , Edward R. Cook
    •  & Peter J. Webster

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Dust deposition brings iron that fuels ocean productivity, a connection impacting climate over geological time. Here the authors use sediment cores to show that in contrast to dynamics today, during the last glacial maximum westerly winds shuttled dust from Australia and South America around Antarctica and into the South Pacific.

    • Torben Struve
    • , Katharina Pahnke
    •  & Gisela Winckler

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