Evidence for a bi-partition of the Younger Dryas Stadial in East Asia associated with inversed climate characteristics compared to Europe

• Published in: Scientific Reports
• Main Authors: Schlolaut, Gordon, Brauer, Achim, Nakagawa, Takeshi, Lamb, Henry F., Tyler, Jonathan J., Staff, Richard A., Marshall, Michael H., Bronk Ramsey, Christopher, Bryant, Charlotte L., Tarasov, Pavel E.
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Published: Nature Publishing Group 2017
• Subjects: Article; North Atlantic
• Online Access: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5374484/; http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28361872; https://doi.org/10.1038/srep44983

The Younger Dryas Stadial (YDS) was an episode of northern hemispheric cooling which occurred within the Last Glacial Interglacial Transition (LGIT). A major driver for the YDS climate was a weakening of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC). It has been inferred that the AMOC began to strengthen mid-YDS, producing a bipartite structure of the YDS in records from continental Europe. These records imply that the polar front and westerlies shifted northward, producing a warmer second phase of the YDS in Europe. Here we present multi-proxy data from the sediments of Lake Suigetsu (Japan), as evidence that a related bi-partition of the YDS also occurred in East Asia. Besides showing for the first time that the bi-partition was not limited to the North Atlantic/European region, the data also imply a climatic dipole between Europe and East Asia since the cold-warm characteristics are reversed at Lake Suigetsu. We suggest that changes in eastward moisture transport from the North Atlantic are the primary mechanism by which the teleconnection can be explained.