Links between MIS 11 millennial to sub-millennial climate variability and long term trends as revealed by new high resolution EPICA Dome C deuterium data – A comparison with the Holocene

• Published in: Climate of the Past
• Main Authors: B. Minster, A. Landais, J. Jouzel, S. Johnsen, S. Falourd, G. Dreyfus, O. Cattani, E. Capron, V. Masson-Delmotte, M. Debret, K. Pol, B. Stenni
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: Copernicus Publications 2011
• Subjects: Environmental pollution; TD172-193.5; Environmental protection; TD169-171.8; Environmental sciences; GE1-350; Antarctic; The Antarctic; Antarc*; Antarctica; EPICA; ice core
• Online Access: https://doi.org/10.5194/cp-7-437-2011; https://doaj.org/article/903cf0caca0e46b09e8eb35682a8604c

We expand here the description of the Antarctic temperature variability during the long interglacial period occurring ~400 thousand years before the present (Marine Isotopic Stage, MIS 11). Our study is based on new detailed deuterium measurements conducted on the EPICA Dome C ice core, Antarctica, with a ~50 year temporal resolution. Despite an ice diffusion of a length reaching ~8 cm at MIS 11 depth, the data allow us to highlight a variability at multi-centennial scale for MIS 11, as it has already been observed for the Holocene period (MIS 1). The differences between MIS 1 and MIS 11 are analysed regarding the links between multi-millennial trends and sub-millennial variability. The EPICA Dome C deuterium record shows an increased variability and the onset of millennial to sub-millennial periodicities at the beginning of the final cooling phase of MIS 11. Our findings are robust with respect to sensitivity tests on the somewhat uncertain MIS 11 duration.