Haug Gerald H.

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Haug
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Gerald H.
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Evidence from diatom-bound nitrogen isotopes for subarctic Pacific stratification during the last ice age and a link to North Pacific denitrification changes

2007-03-02 , Brunelle, Brigitte G. , Sigman, Daniel M. , Cook, Mea S. , Keigwin, Lloyd D. , Haug, Gerald H. , Plessen, Birgit , Schettler, Georg , Jaccard, Samuel L.

In a piston core from the central Bering Sea, diatom microfossil-bound N isotopes and the concentrations of opal, biogenic barium, calcium carbonate, and organic N are measured over the last glacial/interglacial cycle. Compared to the interglacial sections of the core, the sediments of the last ice age are characterized by 3‰ higher diatom-bound δ 15N, 70 wt % lower opal content and 1200 ppm lower biogenic barium. Taken together and with constraints on sediment accumulation rate, these results suggest a reduced supply of nitrate to the surface due to stronger stratification of the upper water column of the Bering Sea during glacial times, with more complete nitrate consumption resulting from continued iron supply through atmospheric deposition. This finding extends the body of evidence for a pervasive link between cold climates and polar ocean stratification. In addition, we hypothesize that more complete nutrient consumption in the glacial age subarctic Pacific contributed to the previously observed ice age reduction in suboxia and denitrification in the eastern tropical North Pacific by lowering the nutrient content of the intermediate-depth water formed in the subpolar North Pacific. In the deglacial interval of the Bering Sea record, two apparent peaks in export productivity are associated with maxima in diatom-bound and bulk sediment δ 15N. The high δ 15N in these intervals may have resulted from greater surface nutrient consumption during this period. However, the synchroneity of the deglacial peaks in the Bering Sea with similar bulk sediment δ 15N changes in the eastern Pacific margin and the presence of sediment lamination within the Bering Sea during the deposition of the productivity peaks raise the possibility that both regional and local denitrification worked to raise the δ 15N of the nitrate feeding Bering Sea surface waters at these times.

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Deglacial increase of seasonal temperature variability in the tropical ocean

2022-11-30 , Wörmer, Lars , Wendt, Jenny , Boehman, Brenna , Haug, Gerald H. , Hinrichs, Kai-Uwe

The relatively stable Holocene climate was preceded by a pronounced event of abrupt warming in the Northern Hemisphere, the termination of the Younger Dryas (YD) cold period 1,2. Although this transition has been intensively studied, its imprint on low-latitude ocean temperature is still controversial and its effects on sub-annual to decadal climate variability remain poorly understood 1,3,4. Sea surface temperature (SST) variability at these timescales in the tropical Atlantic is expected to intensify under current and future global warming and has considerable consequences for environmental conditions in Africa and South America, and for tropical Pacific climate 5–8. Here we present a 100-µm-resolution record obtained by mass spectrometry imaging (MSI) of long-chain alkenones in sediments from the Cariaco Basin 9–11,and find that annually averaged SST remained stable during the transition into the Holocene. However, seasonality increased more than twofold and approached modern values of 1.6 °C, probably driven by the position and/or annual range of the Intertropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ). We further observe that interannual variability intensified during the early Holocene. Our results demonstrate that sub-decadal-scale SST variability in the tropical Atlantic is sensitive to abrupt changes in climate background, such as those witnessed during the most recent glacial to interglacial transition.

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Early Pliocene increase in thermohaline overturning : a precondition for the development of the modern equatorial Pacific cold tongue

2010-04-15 , Steph, Silke , Tiedemann, Ralf , Prange, Matthias , Groeneveld, Jeroen , Schulz, Michael , Timmermann, Axel , Nürnberg, Dirk , Ruhlemann, Carsten , Saukel, Cornelia , Haug, Gerald H.

Unraveling the processes responsible for Earth's climate transition from an “El Niño–like state” during the warm early Pliocene into a modern-like “La Niña–dominated state” currently challenges the scientific community. Recently, the Pliocene climate switch has been linked to oceanic thermocline shoaling at ∼3 million years ago along with Earth's final transition into a bipolar icehouse world. Here we present Pliocene proxy data and climate model results, which suggest an earlier timing of the Pliocene climate switch and a different chain of forcing mechanisms. We show that the increase in North Atlantic meridional overturning circulation between 4.8 and 4.0 million years ago, initiated by the progressive closure of the Central American Seaway, triggered overall shoaling of the tropical thermocline. This preconditioned the turnaround from a warm eastern equatorial Pacific to the modern equatorial cold tongue state about 1 million years earlier than previously assumed. Since ∼3.6–3.5 million years ago, the intensification of Northern Hemisphere glaciation resulted in a strengthening of the trade winds, thereby amplifying upwelling and biogenic productivity at low latitudes.

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Causes of ice age intensification across the Mid-Pleistocene Transition

2017-11-27 , Chalk, Thomas B. , Hain, Mathis P. , Foster, Gavin L. , Rohling, Eelco J. , Sexton, Philip F. , Badger, Marcus P. S. , Cherry, Soraya G. , Hasenfratz, Adam P. , Haug, Gerald H. , Jaccard, Samuel L. , Martínez-García, Alfredo , Pälike, Heiko , Pancost, Richard D. , Wilson, Paul A.

During the Mid-Pleistocene Transition (MPT; 1,200–800 kya), Earth’s orbitally paced ice age cycles intensified, lengthened from ∼40,000 (∼40 ky) to ∼100 ky, and became distinctly asymmetrical. Testing hypotheses that implicate changing atmospheric CO2 levels as a driver of the MPT has proven difficult with available observations. Here, we use orbitally resolved, boron isotope CO2 data to show that the glacial to interglacial CO2 difference increased from ∼43 to ∼75 μatm across the MPT, mainly because of lower glacial CO2 levels. Through carbon cycle modeling, we attribute this decline primarily to the initiation of substantive dust-borne iron fertilization of the Southern Ocean during peak glacial stages. We also observe a twofold steepening of the relationship between sea level and CO2-related climate forcing that is suggestive of a change in the dynamics that govern ice sheet stability, such as that expected from the removal of subglacial regolith or interhemispheric ice sheet phase-locking. We argue that neither ice sheet dynamics nor CO2 change in isolation can explain the MPT. Instead, we infer that the MPT was initiated by a change in ice sheet dynamics and that longer and deeper post-MPT ice ages were sustained by carbon cycle feedbacks related to dust fertilization of the Southern Ocean as a consequence of larger ice sheets.

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