Glacial-to-Holocene evolution of sea surface temperature and surface circulation in the subarctic northwest Pacific and the Western Bering Sea

It has been proposed that North Pacific sea surface temperature (SST) evolution was intimately linked to North Atlantic climate oscillations during the last glacial-interglacial transition. However, during the early deglaciation and the Last Glacial Maximum, the SST development in the subarctic nort...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Paleoceanography
Main Authors: Meyer, Vera D., Max, Lars, Hefter, Jens, Tiedemann, Ralf, Mollenhauer, Gesine
Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
Language:English
Published: Amer Geophysical Union 2016
Subjects:
TEX86L
surface circulation
northwest Pacific
Bering Sea
deglaciation
Alaska Point
Greenland
Gulf of Alaska
Pacific
Western Basin
Greenland ice cores
North Atlantic
Subarctic
Alaska
Online Access:https://archimer.ifremer.fr/doc/00421/53231/54786.pdf
https://doi.org/10.1002/2015PA002877
https://archimer.ifremer.fr/doc/00421/53231/
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Summary:It has been proposed that North Pacific sea surface temperature (SST) evolution was intimately linked to North Atlantic climate oscillations during the last glacial-interglacial transition. However, during the early deglaciation and the Last Glacial Maximum, the SST development in the subarctic northwest Pacific and the Bering Sea is poorly constrained as most existing deglacial SST records are based on alkenone paleothermometry, which is limited prior to 15ka B.P. in the subarctic North Pacific realm. By applying the TEX86L temperature proxy we obtain glacial-Holocene-SST records for the marginal northwest Pacific and the Western Bering Sea. Our TEX86L-based records and existing alkenone data suggest that during the past 15.5ka, SSTs in the northwest Pacific and the Western Bering Sea closely followed millennial-scale climate fluctuations known from Greenland ice cores, indicating rapid atmospheric teleconnections with abrupt climate changes in the North Atlantic. Our SST reconstructions indicate that in the Western Bering Sea SSTs drop significantly during Heinrich Stadial 1 (HS1), similar to the known North Atlantic climate history. In contrast, progressively rising SST in the northwest Pacific is different to the North Atlantic climate development during HS1. Similarities between the northwest Pacific SST and climate records from the Gulf of Alaska point to a stronger influence of Alaskan Stream waters connecting the eastern and western basin of the North Pacific during this time. During the Holocene, dissimilar climate trends point to reduced influence of the Alaskan Stream in the northwest Pacific.

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