The vegetation and climate history of the last glacial cycle in a new pollen record from Lake Fimon (southern Alpine foreland, N-Italy)

2010 ◽  
Vol 29 (23-24) ◽  
pp. 3115-3137 ◽  
Author(s):  
R. Pini ◽  
C. Ravazzi ◽  
P.J. Reimer
Keyword(s):  
Pollen Record ◽  
Glacial Cycle ◽  
Climate History ◽  
Last Glacial ◽  
History Of ◽  
Alpine Foreland ◽  
Vegetation And Climate ◽  
The Last Glacial

scholarly journals Coupled Northern Hemisphere permafrost–ice-sheet evolution over the last glacial cycle

2015 ◽  
Vol 11 (9) ◽  
pp. 1165-1180 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. Willeit ◽  
A. Ganopolski
Keyword(s):  
Heat Flux ◽  
Northern Hemisphere ◽  
Ice Sheet ◽  
The Arctic ◽  
Sediment Layer ◽  
Glacial Cycle ◽  
Geothermal Heat ◽  
Climate History ◽  
Last Glacial ◽  
The Last Glacial

Abstract. Permafrost influences a number of processes which are relevant for local and global climate. For example, it is well known that permafrost plays an important role in global carbon and methane cycles. Less is known about the interaction between permafrost and ice sheets. In this study a permafrost module is included in the Earth system model CLIMBER-2, and the coupled Northern Hemisphere (NH) permafrost–ice-sheet evolution over the last glacial cycle is explored. The model performs generally well at reproducing present-day permafrost extent and thickness. Modeled permafrost thickness is sensitive to the values of ground porosity, thermal conductivity and geothermal heat flux. Permafrost extent at the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) agrees well with reconstructions and previous modeling estimates. Present-day permafrost thickness is far from equilibrium over deep permafrost regions. Over central Siberia and the Arctic Archipelago permafrost is presently up to 200–500 m thicker than it would be at equilibrium. In these areas, present-day permafrost depth strongly depends on the past climate history and simulations indicate that deep permafrost has a memory of surface temperature variations going back to at least 800 ka. Over the last glacial cycle permafrost has a relatively modest impact on simulated NH ice sheet volume except at LGM, when including permafrost increases ice volume by about 15 m sea level equivalent in our model. This is explained by a delayed melting of the ice base from below by the geothermal heat flux when the ice sheet sits on a porous sediment layer and permafrost has to be melted first. Permafrost affects ice sheet dynamics only when ice extends over areas covered by thick sediments, which is the case at LGM.

Last Glacial Maximum to near present 10Be chronology of the Universidad glacier fluctuations in the Subtropical Chilean Andes (34° S): paleoclimate implications  

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hans Fernández ◽  
Juan-Luis García ◽  
Samuel U. Nussbaumer ◽  
Alessa Geiger ◽  
Isabelle Gärtner-Roer ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Last Glacial Maximum ◽  
Late Glacial ◽  
Glacial Maximum ◽  
Ice Age ◽  
Climate History ◽  
Last Glacial ◽  
Exposure Dating ◽  
Glacier Fluctuations ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Last Glacial

<p>The geochronological and geomorphological reconstruction of glacier fluctuations is required to assess the timing and structure of climate changes of the last glacial cycle in the subtropical Andes of Chile. The scarcity of data in this region limits the knowledge related to the timing of glacial landscape changes during this long-term period. To provide a new framework to better understand the climate history of the semiarid Andes of Chile, we have reconstructed the glacial history of the Universidad glacier (34° S).</p><p>Our mapping shows the existence of four moraine belts (UNI I to UNI IV, from outer to inner) that are spatially unequally distributed along the 13 km of the valley between ~2500 and ~1400 m a.s.l. We applied <sup>10</sup>Be cosmogenic surface exposure dating to 26 granodioritic boulders on moraines and determined the age of the associated glacial advances. UNI I moraine represents the distal glacier advance between 20.8±0.8 and 17.8±0.8 kyr ago (number of <sup>10</sup>Be samples = 11). Other two significative glacier advances terminated one and four km up-valley from the UNI I moraine, respectively, formed 16.1±0.9 kyr (n=1) (UNI II) and 14.6±1 to 10±0.5 kyr ago (n=3) (UNI III). A sequence of six distinct and smaller moraine ridges has been identified in the proglacial area. They are part of last significative glacier advances labeled as UNI IV. The four distal ridges have been dated to between 645-150 years ago (n=11), while the most proximal moraines coincide with mid-20<sup>th</sup> century and 1997 aerial photographs.</p><p>The results indicate that the Universidad glacier advanced during the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) (UNI I). Deglaciation was punctuated by glacier readvances during the Late Glacial when the UNI II and UNI III moraines were deposited. Finally, UNI IV moraine shows six glacier fluctuations developed between the 14th and 20<sup>th</sup> centuries.</p><p>Our data suggest that the glacier advances by the Universidad glacier were triggered by intensified southern westerly winds bringing colder and wetter conditions to subtropical latitudes in the SE Pacific. Moreover, our data indicate that more or less in-phase Late-Glacial advances along the tropical and extratropical Andes occurred. We discuss different climate forcings that explain these glacier changes. Finally, we illustrate the influence of the “Little Ice Age” in the Semiarid Andes.</p>

A high-resolution record of vegetation and climate through the last glacial cycle from Caledonia Fen, southeastern highlands of Australia

2007 ◽  
Vol 22 (5) ◽  
pp. 481-500 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. P. Kershaw ◽  
G. M. McKenzie ◽  
N. Porch ◽  
R. G. Roberts ◽  
J. Brown ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
High Resolution ◽  
Glacial Cycle ◽  
Last Glacial ◽  
Vegetation And Climate ◽  
The Last Glacial

scholarly journals Last-glacial-cycle glacier erosion potential in the Alps

2021 ◽  
Vol 9 (4) ◽  
pp. 923-935
Author(s):  
Julien Seguinot ◽  
Ian Delaney
Keyword(s):  
Climatic Conditions ◽  
High Mountain ◽  
Glacial Cycle ◽  
Glacier Surface ◽  
Climate History ◽  
Last Glacial ◽  
Erosion Rates ◽  
Erosion Processes ◽  
The Alps ◽  
The Last Glacial

Abstract. The glacial landscape of the Alps has fascinated generations of explorers, artists, mountaineers, and scientists with its diversity, including erosional features of all scales from high-mountain cirques to steep glacial valleys and large overdeepened basins. Using previous glacier modelling results and empirical inferences of bedrock erosion under modern glaciers, we compute a distribution of potential glacier erosion in the Alps over the last glacial cycle from 120 000 years ago to the present. Despite large uncertainties pertaining to the climate history of the Alps and unconstrained glacier erosion processes, the resulting modelled patterns of glacier erosion include persistent features. The cumulative imprint of the last glacial cycle shows a very strong localization of erosion potential with local maxima at the mouths of major Alpine valleys and some other upstream sections where glaciers are modelled to have flowed with the highest velocity. The potential erosion rates vary significantly through the glacial cycle but show paradoxically little relation to the total glacier volume. Phases of glacier advance and maximum extension see a localization of rapid potential erosion rates at low elevation, while glacier erosion at higher elevation is modelled to date from phases of less extensive glaciation. The modelled erosion rates peak during deglaciation phases, when frontal retreat results in steeper glacier surface slopes, implying that climatic conditions that result in rapid glacier erosion might be quite transient and specific. Our results depict the Alpine glacier erosion landscape as a time-transgressive patchwork, with different parts of the range corresponding to different glaciation stages and time periods.

scholarly journals Modeling the marine extent of Northern Hemisphere ice sheets during the last glacial cycle

2003 ◽  
Vol 37 ◽  
pp. 173-180 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chris Zweck ◽  
Philippe Huybrechts
Keyword(s):  
Northern Hemisphere ◽  
Water Depth ◽  
Three Dimensional ◽  
Ice Sheets ◽  
Ice Sheet ◽  
Glacial Cycle ◽  
Last Glacial ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Last Glacial Maximum ◽  
The Last Glacial

AbstractMechanisms that determine time-dependent changes of the marine ice margin in dynamic ice-sheet models are important but poorly understood. Here we derive an empirical formulation for changes in the marine extent when modelling the Northern Hemisphere ice sheets over the last glacial cycle in a three-dimensional thermomechanically coupled ice-sheet model. We assume that the strongest control on changes in marine extent is ice calving, and that the variable most crucial to calving is water depth. The empirical marine-extent relationship is tuned so that the major marine-retreat history of the Laurentide and Eurasian ice sheets is modelled accurately in time and space. We find that this empirical treatment relating marine extent to water depth is sufficient to reproduce the observations, and discuss the implications for the physics of marine margin changes and the dynamics of the Northern Hemisphere ice sheets since the Last Glacial Maximum.

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