Coupled ocean-land millennial-scale changes 1.26millionyears ago, recorded at Site U1385 off Portugal

While a growing body of evidence indicates that North Atlantic millennial-scale climate variability extends to the Early Pleistocene, its impact on terrestrial ecosystems has not been established. Here we present ultra-high resolution (70–140 year) joint foraminiferal isotopic and pollen analyses fr...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Tzedakis, PC, Margari, V, Hodell, DA
Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
Language:English
Published: Elsevier BV 2015
Subjects:
Online Access:https://www.repository.cam.ac.uk/handle/1810/252465
Description
Summary:While a growing body of evidence indicates that North Atlantic millennial-scale climate variability extends to the Early Pleistocene, its impact on terrestrial ecosystems has not been established. Here we present ultra-high resolution (70–140 year) joint foraminiferal isotopic and pollen analyses from IODP Site U1385 off Portugal, focusing on a short glacial section of Marine Isotope Stage 38, ~ 1.26 million years ago. Our records reveal the presence of millennial-scale variability in the coupled ocean–atmosphere-land system in the North Atlantic and provide the first direct evidence for the response of western Iberian vegetation to abrupt climate changes in the Early Pleistocene. The magnitude and pacing of changes bear significant similarities to Dansgaard-Oeschger variability of the Late/Middle Pleistocene. The work was funded by a Leverhulme Trust Research Project Grant (RPG2014-41) and a Natural Environment Research Council Grant (NE/K005804/1). This research used samples and data provided by the Integrated Ocean Drilling Program (IODP). This is the accepted manuscript. It first appeared at http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.gloplacha.2015.10.008