A global synthesis of high-resolution stable isotope data from benthic foraminifera of the last deglaciation.

We present the first version of the Ocean Circulation and Carbon Cycling (OC3) working group database, of oxygen and carbon stable isotope ratios from benthic foraminifera in deep ocean sediment cores from the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM, 23-19 ky) to the Holocene (<10 ky) with a particular focus on the early last deglaciation (19-15 ky BP). It includes 287 globally distributed coring sites, with metadata, isotopic and chronostratigraphic information, and age models. A quality check was performed for all data and age models, and sites with at least millennial resolution were preferred. Deep water mass structure as well as differences between the early deglaciation and LGM are captured by the data, even though its coverage is still sparse in many regions. We find high correlations among time series calculated with different age models at sites that allow such analysis. The database provides a useful dynamical approach to map physical and biogeochemical changes of the ocean throughout the last deglaciation.

Role of climate in the rise and fall of the Neo-Assyrian Empire.

Northern Iraq was the political and economic center of the Neo-Assyrian Empire (c. 912 to 609 BCE)-the largest and most powerful empire of its time. After more than two centuries of regional dominance, the Neo-Assyrian state plummeted from its zenith (c. 670 BCE) to complete political collapse (c. 615 to 609 BCE). Earlier explanations for the Assyrian collapse focused on the roles of internal politico-economic conflicts, territorial overextension, and military defeat. Here, we present a high-resolution and precisely dated speleothem record of climate change from the Kuna Ba cave in northern Iraq, which suggests that the empire's rise occurred during a two-centuries-long interval of anomalously wet climate in the context of the past 4000 years, while megadroughts during the early-mid seventh century BCE, as severe as recent droughts in the region but lasting for decades, triggered a decline in Assyria's agrarian productivity and thus contributed to its eventual political and economic collapse.

Multi-year predictability of climate, drought, and wildfire in southwestern North America.

Past severe droughts over North America have led to massive water shortages and increases in wildfire frequency. Triggering sources for multi-year droughts in this region include randomly occurring atmospheric blocking patterns, ocean impacts on atmospheric circulation, and climate's response to anthropogenic radiative forcings. A combination of these sources translates into a difficulty to predict the onset and length of such droughts on multi-year timescales. Here we present results from a new multi-year dynamical prediction system that exhibits a high degree of skill in forecasting wildfire probabilities and drought for 10-23 and 10-45 months lead time, which extends far beyond the current seasonal prediction activities for southwestern North America. Using a state-of-the-art earth system model along with 3-dimensional ocean data assimilation and by prescribing the external radiative forcings, this system simulates the observed low-frequency variability of precipitation, soil water, and wildfire probabilities in close agreement with observational records and reanalysis data. The underlying source of multi-year predictability can be traced back to variations of the Atlantic/Pacific sea surface temperature gradient, external radiative forcings, and the low-pass filtering characteristics of soils.

Climate change patterns in Amazonia and biodiversity.

Precise characterization of hydroclimate variability in Amazonia on various timescales is critical to understanding the link between climate change and biodiversity. Here we present absolute-dated speleothem oxygen isotope records that characterize hydroclimate variation in western and eastern Amazonia over the past 250 and 20 ka, respectively. Although our records demonstrate the coherent millennial-scale precipitation variability across tropical-subtropical South America, the orbital-scale precipitation variability between western and eastern Amazonia exhibits a quasi-dipole pattern. During the last glacial period, our records imply a modest increase in precipitation amount in western Amazonia but a significant drying in eastern Amazonia, suggesting that higher biodiversity in western Amazonia, contrary to 'Refugia Hypothesis', is maintained under relatively stable climatic conditions. In contrast, the glacial-interglacial climatic perturbations might have been instances of loss rather than gain in biodiversity in eastern Amazonia, where forests may have been more susceptible to fragmentation in response to larger swings in hydroclimate.

Southern Hemisphere and deep-sea warming led deglacial atmospheric CO2 rise and tropical warming.

Establishing what caused Earth's largest climatic changes in the past requires a precise knowledge of both the forcing and the regional responses. We determined the chronology of high- and low-latitude climate change at the last glacial termination by radiocarbon dating benthic and planktonic foraminiferal stable isotope and magnesium/calcium records from a marine core collected in the western tropical Pacific. Deep-sea temperatures warmed by approximately 2 degrees C between 19 and 17 thousand years before the present (ky B.P.), leading the rise in atmospheric CO2 and tropical-surface-ocean warming by approximately 1000 years. The cause of this deglacial deep-water warming does not lie within the tropics, nor can its early onset between 19 and 17 ky B.P. be attributed to CO2 forcing. Increasing austral-spring insolation combined with sea-ice albedo feedbacks appear to be the key factors responsible for this warming.

Ventilation of the glacial deep Pacific Ocean.

Measurements of the age difference between coexisting benthic and planktic foraminifera from western equatorial Pacific deep-sea cores suggest that during peak glacial time the radiocarbon age of water at 2-kilometers depth was no greater than that of today. These results make unlikely suggestions that a slowdown in deep-ocean ventilation was responsible for a sizable fraction of the increase of the ratio of carbon-14 (14C) to carbon in the atmosphere and surface ocean during glacial time. Comparison of 14C ages for coexisting wood and planktic foraminifera from the same site suggests that the atmosphere to surface ocean 14C to C ratio difference was not substantially different from today's.

Decline of surface temperature and salinity in the western tropical Pacific Ocean in the Holocene epoch.

In the present-day climate, surface water salinities are low in the western tropical Pacific Ocean and increase towards the eastern part of the basin. The salinity of surface waters in the tropical Pacific Ocean is thought to be controlled by a combination of atmospheric convection, precipitation, evaporation and ocean dynamics, and on interannual timescales significant variability is associated with the El Niño/Southern Oscillation cycles. However, little is known about the variability of the coupled ocean-atmosphere system on timescales of centuries to millennia. Here we combine oxygen isotope and Mg/Ca data from foraminifers retrieved from three sediment cores in the western tropical Pacific Ocean to reconstruct Holocene sea surface temperatures and salinities in the region. We find a decrease in sea surface temperatures of approximately 0.5 degrees C over the past 10,000 yr, whereas sea surface salinities decreased by approximately 1.5 practical salinity units. Our data imply either that the Pacific basin as a whole has become progressively less salty or that the present salinity gradient along the Equator has developed relatively recently.

Magnitude and timing of temperature change in the Indo-Pacific warm pool during deglaciation.

Ocean-atmosphere interactions in the tropical Pacific region have a strong influence on global heat and water vapour transport and thus constitute an important component of the climate system. Changes in sea surface temperatures and convection in the tropical Indo-Pacific region are thought to be responsible for the interannual to decadal climate variability observed in extra-tropical regions, but the role of the tropics in climate changes on millennial and orbital timescales is less clear. Here we analyse oxygen isotopes and Mg/Ca ratios of foraminiferal shells from the Makassar strait in the heart of the Indo-Pacific warm pool, to obtain synchronous estimates of sea surface temperatures and ice volume. We find that sea surface temperatures increased by 3.5-4.0 degrees C during the last two glacial-interglacial transitions, synchronous with the global increase in atmospheric CO2 and Antarctic warming, but the temperature increase occurred 2,000-3,000 years before the Northern Hemisphere ice sheets melted. Our observations suggest that the tropical Pacific region plays an important role in driving glacial-interglacial cycles, possibly through a system similar to how El Niño/Southern Oscillation regulates the poleward flux of heat and water vapour.

Super ENSO and global climate oscillations at millennial time scales.

The late Pleistocene history of seawater temperature and salinity variability in the western tropical Pacific warm pool is reconstructed from oxygen isotope (delta18O) and magnesium/calcium composition of planktonic foraminifera. Differentiating the calcite delta18O record into components of temperature and local water delta18O reveals a dominant salinity signal that varied in accord with Dansgaard/Oeschger cycles over Greenland. Salinities were higher at times of high-latitude cooling and were lower during interstadials. The pattern and magnitude of the salinity variations imply shifts in the tropical Pacific ocean/atmosphere system analogous to modern El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO). El Niño conditions correlate with stadials at high latitudes, whereas La Niña conditions correlate with interstadials. Millennial-scale shifts in atmospheric convection away from the western tropical Pacific may explain many paleo-observations, including lower atmospheric CO2, N2O, and CH4 during stadials and patterns of extratropical ocean variability that have tropical source functions that are negatively correlated with El Niño.