2.8 million years of Arctic climate change from Lake El'gygytgyn, NE Russia.
The reliability of Arctic climate predictions is currently hampered by insufficient knowledge of natural climate variability in the past. A sediment core from Lake El'gygytgyn in northeastern (NE) Russia provides a continuous, high-resolution record from the Arctic, spanning the past 2.8 million years. This core reveals numerous "super interglacials" during the Quaternary; for marine benthic isotope stages (MIS) 11c and 31, maximum summer temperatures and annual precipitation values are ~4° to 5°C and ~300 millimeters higher than those of MIS 1 and 5e. Climate simulations show that these extreme warm conditions are difficult to explain with greenhouse gas and astronomical forcing alone, implying the importance of amplifying feedbacks and far field influences. The timing of Arctic warming relative to West Antarctic Ice Sheet retreats implies strong interhemispheric climate connectivity.
Institute of Geology and Mineralogy, University of Cologne, Zuelpicher Strasse 49a, D-50674 Cologne, Germany. mmelles@uni-koeln.de
Martin
M
Melles
Julie
J
Brigham-Grette
Pavel S
PS
Minyuk
Norbert R
NR
Nowaczyk
Volker
V
Wennrich
Robert M
RM
DeConto
Patricia M
PM
Anderson
Andrei A
AA
Andreev
Anthony
A
Coletti
Timothy L
TL
Cook
Eeva
E
Haltia-Hovi
Maaret
M
Kukkonen
Anatoli V
AV
Lozhkin
Peter
P
Rosén
Pavel
P
Tarasov
Hendrik
H
Vogel
Bernd
B
Wagner
D001110:Arctic Regions; D057231:Climate Change; D003081:Cold Climate; D019015:Geologic Sediments; D046448:Ice Cover; D060106:Lakes; D055110:Radiometric Dating; D012426:Russia; D013997:Time Factors