Onset and Role of the Antarctic Circumpolar Current.

• Main Authors: Peter F Barker, Fabio Florindo, Ellen E Martin, Howard D Scher
• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Subjects: Antarctic; The Antarctic; Antarc*
• Online Access: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.547.1173; http://www.earth-prints.org/bitstream/2122/2184/1/1214.pdf

The major role for the ACC, as inferred in the past, is to have caused or stabilised full Antarctic glaciation. This role has since been questioned, and other hypothesised roles are relatively minor. Using a “smoking gun ” assumption, determination of the time of onset of an ACC will resolve uncertainties in its role, and constrain the importance of ocean circulation to climate. To this end, we summarise all published estimates of ACC onset. The time of onset, of shallow circulation or deep, is extremely uncertain, whether based on tectonic studies or the interpretation of changes in the sediment record. Two potential final barriers to circumpolar flow have been identified; south of Tasmania and south of South America. The former is well-constrained by tectonics and marine geology to before 32 Ma for a deep gap, with a shallow gap in place by 35.5 Ma at the latest. These ages fit nicely with the onset of full Antarctic glaciation at 33-34 Ma, although some workers deny the causality. Estimates of the time of opening of the latter range very widely, whether based on tectonics or sedimentary geology, from as recently as 6 Ma to as early as 41 Ma, with the gap depth uncertain also. Resolution of the tectonics-based uncertainties by additional survey being most probably both time-