Antarctic Climate History and Global Climate Changes

Author(s):  
Pontus Lurcock ◽  
Fabio Florindo

Antarctic climate changes have been reconstructed from ice and sediment cores and numerical models (which also predict future changes). Major ice sheets first appeared 34 million years ago (Ma) and fluctuated throughout the Oligocene, with an overall cooling trend. Ice volume more than doubled at the Oligocene-Miocene boundary. Fluctuating Miocene temperatures peaked at 17–14 Ma, followed by dramatic cooling. Cooling continued through the Pliocene and Pleistocene, with another major glacial expansion at 3–2 Ma. Several interacting drivers control Antarctic climate. On timescales of 10,000–100,000 years, insolation varies with orbital cycles, causing periodic climate variations. Opening of Southern Ocean gateways produced a circumpolar current that thermally isolated Antarctica. Declining atmospheric CO2 triggered Cenozoic glaciation. Antarctic glaciations affect global climate by lowering sea level, intensifying atmospheric circulation, and increasing planetary albedo. Ice sheets interact with ocean water, forming water masses that play a key role in global ocean circulation.

Author(s):  
Pontus Lurcock ◽  
Fabio Florindo

Antarctic climate changes have been reconstructed from ice and sediment cores and numerical models (which also predict future changes). Major ice sheets first appeared 34 million years ago (Ma) and fluctuated throughout the Oligocene, with an overall cooling trend. Ice volume more than doubled at the Oligocene-Miocene boundary. Fluctuating Miocene temperatures peaked at 17–14 Ma, followed by dramatic cooling. Cooling continued through the Pliocene and Pleistocene, with another major glacial expansion at 3–2 Ma. Several interacting drivers control Antarctic climate. On timescales of 10,000–100,000 years, insolation varies with orbital cycles, causing periodic climate variations. Opening of Southern Ocean gateways produced a circumpolar current that thermally isolated Antarctica. Declining atmospheric CO2 triggered Cenozoic glaciation. Antarctic glaciations affect global climate by lowering sea level, intensifying atmospheric circulation, and increasing planetary albedo. Ice sheets interact with ocean water, forming water masses that play a key role in global ocean circulation.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eleen Zirks ◽  
Thomas Westerhold ◽  
Matthias Schneider ◽  
Gabriele Uenzelmann-Neben

<p>Previous scientific ocean drilling expeditions have revealed that sediments deposited in the Kerguelen Plateau region have the potential to provide an out-standing chronicle of regional and global climate changes. In particular, this area is an excellent location to monitor subantarctic and high-latitude climate dynamics and obtain far-field information documenting Antarctic climate history in a world warmer than today.</p><p>Here we report first results from site survey RV Sonne cruise SO272 that sailed January 11 to March 4 2020 from Port Louis, Mauritius, to Cape Town, South Africa. During the cruise ~4000 km of high resolution seismic reflection data were recorded along 18 seismic profiles across the central and southern Kerguelen Plateau. At 11 stations sediment cores with recoveries of up to 10m were retrieved [GU1] to complement the seismic studies and provide ages of the outcropping sediment at the sea floor. Three gravity cores targeted the Labuan Basin recovering Plio-Pleistocene diatom ooze with drop stones and rhythmic changes in reflectance. Eight gravity cores targeted the Raggatt Basin with the main objective to penetrate through the upper undifferentiated layer of surface sediment and probe the below much older outcropping sediment. Carbonate rich sediments were successfully retrieved at three locations with microfossil assemblages of late Eocene age. X-ray fluorescence core scanning, benthic stable isotope and bio-stratigraphic data will be presented. Seismic and geological datasets will form the base for an IODP full proposal to drill a complete Miocene to Paleocene high latitude sediment package, build upon the #983-Pre IODP proposal.</p>


2015 ◽  
Vol 11 (6) ◽  
pp. 5401-5438 ◽  
Author(s):  
T. Guillemot ◽  
V. Bichet ◽  
A. Simonneau ◽  
D. Rius ◽  
C. Massa ◽  
...  

Abstract. Due to its sensitivity to climate changes, south Greenland is a particularly suitable area to study past global climate changes and their influence on locale Human settlements. A paleohydrological investigation was therefore carried out on two river-fed lakes: Lake Qallimiut and Little Kangerluluup, both located close to the Labrador Sea in the historic farming center of Greenland. Two sediment cores (QAL-2011 and LKG-2011), spanning the last four millennia, were retrieved and showed similar thin laminae, described by high magnetic susceptibility and density, high titanium and TOC / TN atomic ratio, and coarse grain size. They are also characterized either by inverse grading followed by normal grading or by normal grading only and a prevalence of red amorphous particles and lignocellulosic fragments, typical of flood deposits. Flood events showed similar trend in both records: they mainly occurred during cooler and wetter periods characterized by weaker Greenlandic paleo-temperatures, substantial glacier advances, and a high precipitation on the Greenlandic Ice Sheet and North Atlantic ice-rafting events. They can therefore be interpreted as a result of ice and snow-melting episodes. They occurred especially during rapid climate changes (RCC) such as the Middle to Late Holocene transition around 2250 BC, the Sub-boreal/Sub-atlantic transition around 700 BC and the Little Ice Age (LIA) between AD 1300 and AD 1900, separated by cycles of 1500 years and driven by solar forcing. These global RCC revealed by QAL-2011 and LKG-2011 flood events may have influenced Human settlements in south Greenland, especially the paleo-Eskimo cultures and the Norse settlement, and have been mainly responsible for their demise.


2006 ◽  
Vol 411 (2) ◽  
pp. 1485-1488 ◽  
Author(s):  
I. I. Mokhov ◽  
A. V. Chernokulsky ◽  
I. M. Shkolnik

Author(s):  
А.А. Лагутин ◽  
Н.В. Волков ◽  
Е.Ю. Мордвин

Представлены результаты исследований влияния глобальных климатических изменений системы Земля на климат Западной Сибири. Для установления зон региона, в которых к середине XXI в. прогнозируются изменения, использовались модельные данные региональной климатической модели RegCM4 и принятые в этом классе задач стандартизованные евклидовы расстояния между характеристиками климата для двух состояний климатической системы — современного и будущего. Установлены зоны Западной Сибири, в которых в рамках сценариев RCP 4.5 и RCP 8.5 возможной эволюции глобальной системы к 2050 г. прогнозируются изменения климата. Purpose. An analysis of the influence of a global climate changes on the climate of Western Siberia, determination of zones of the region where changes are expected in the middle of the twenty-first century. Methodology. Results obtained using the model data of the regional climate model RegCM4 and the standardized Euclidean distances between climate characteristics. Findings, originality. Simulations of the climate characteristics for the two states of the climate system — contemporary and future — have been carried out. The zones of Western Siberia region, in which climate change is expected in the framework of RCP 4.5 and RCP 8.5 radiative forcing scenarios by the 2050, have been determined.


2012 ◽  
Vol 61-64 ◽  
pp. 73-84 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sergey A. Gorbarenko ◽  
Naomi Harada ◽  
Mikhail I. Malakhov ◽  
Tatyana A. Velivetskaya ◽  
Yuriy P. Vasilenko ◽  
...  

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