Andean glaciers: memory of tropical climate
International audience The reconstruction of past climate variability offers important information about our climate system. Ice cores extractedfrom polar ice sheets or from mountainous glaciers are among the most popular climate archives. Ice cores from Andean glaciersin South America have been stu...
Published in: | Quaternaire |
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Main Author: | |
Other Authors: | , , , , , |
Format: | Article in Journal/Newspaper |
Language: | French |
Published: |
HAL CCSD
2017
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Subjects: | |
Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.4000/quaternaire.8096 https://hal.umontpellier.fr/hal-02093971/file/quaternaire-8096.pdf https://hal.umontpellier.fr/hal-02093971 |
Summary: | International audience The reconstruction of past climate variability offers important information about our climate system. Ice cores extractedfrom polar ice sheets or from mountainous glaciers are among the most popular climate archives. Ice cores from Andean glaciersin South America have been studied since the 1980’s. Almost ten ice cores have been extracted from the equator to Patagonia. Theycover different time periods from the last century to the last glacial-interglacial termination that started 21,000 years ago. Those icecores are usually dated by using a combination of methods: annual layers counting in both isotopic and chemical ice composition,radionuclides concentration analysis to detect atmospheric nuclear tests during the 20th century and ice flow modeling for the deepestpart of those cores. This paper presents two interesting results arising from the isotopic composition of the ice. The first one dealswith the isotopic records of Bolivian (Illimani) and Peruvian (Quelccaya) ice cores in regards to the reconstruction of glacier extentduring the little ice age in the 17th-18th century. Both approaches suggest a slightly moister and cooler period from 1650 to 1780. Thesecond result arises from the 120-year long isotopic record of an ice core drilled in Patagonia (San Valentin). It suggests that at theregional scale, temperature has regularly decreased of about 0.2 °C per decade, extending the temperature decrease shown by Chileanmeteorological data since the 1970’s despite a global warming. Reconstruire les variations passées de notre climat permet de mieux appréhender le fonctionnement de notre système climatique.Les carottes de glace issues des calottes polaires et des glaciers montagneux de haute altitude sont de très bonnes archivesclimatiques. Les glaciers présents sur les sommets des Andes sud-américaines sont ainsi exploités depuis les années 80. Une dizainede carottages ont été réalisés depuis l’équateur jusqu’en Patagonie. Ils recouvrent des périodes très différentes allant du ... |
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