Annual layering in the NGRIP ice core during the Eemian ...

The Greenland NGRIP ice core continuously covers the period from present day back to 123 ka before present, which includes several thousand years of ice from the previous interglacial period, MIS 5e or the Eemian. In the glacial part of the core, annual layers can be identified from impurity records...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Dahl-Jensen, D., Kettner, E., Nielsen, M., Johnsen, S., Svensson, A., Bigler, Matthias, Kipfstuhl, S., Steffensen, J. P.
Format: Text
Language:English
Published: Copernicus Publications 2011
Subjects:
Online Access:https://dx.doi.org/10.7892/boris.10126
http://boris.unibe.ch/10126/
Description
Summary:The Greenland NGRIP ice core continuously covers the period from present day back to 123 ka before present, which includes several thousand years of ice from the previous interglacial period, MIS 5e or the Eemian. In the glacial part of the core, annual layers can be identified from impurity records and visual stratigraphy, and stratigraphic layer counting has been performed back to 60 ka. In the deepest part of the core, however, the ice is close to the pressure melting point, the visual stratigraphy is dominated by crystal boundaries, and annual layering is not visible to the naked eye. In this study, we apply a newly developed setup for high-resolution ice core impurity analysis to produce continuous records of dust, sodium and ammonium concentrations as well as conductivity of melt water. We analyzed three 2.2 m sections of ice from the Eemian and the glacial inception. In all of the analyzed ice, annual layers can clearly be recognized, most prominently in the dust and conductivity profiles. Part of the ...