Publication Date:
2014-09-06
Description:
Greenland ice core water isotopic composition (delta(18)O) provides detailed evidence for abrupt climate changes but is by itself insufficient for quantitative reconstruction of past temperatures and their spatial patterns. We investigate Greenland temperature evolution during the last deglaciation using independent reconstructions from three ice cores and simulations with a coupled ocean-atmosphere climate model. Contrary to the traditional delta(18)O interpretation, the Younger Dryas period was 4.5 degrees +/- 2 degrees C warmer than the Oldest Dryas, due to increased carbon dioxide forcing and summer insolation. The magnitude of abrupt temperature changes is larger in central Greenland (9 degrees to 14 degrees C) than in the northwest (5 degrees to 9 degrees C), fingerprinting a North Atlantic origin. Simulated changes in temperature seasonality closely track changes in the Atlantic overturning strength and support the hypothesis that abrupt climate change is mostly a winter phenomenon.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Notes: 〈/span〉Buizert, Christo -- Gkinis, Vasileios -- Severinghaus, Jeffrey P -- He, Feng -- Lecavalier, Benoit S -- Kindler, Philippe -- Leuenberger, Markus -- Carlson, Anders E -- Vinther, Bo -- Masson-Delmotte, Valerie -- White, James W C -- Liu, Zhengyu -- Otto-Bliesner, Bette -- Brook, Edward J -- New York, N.Y. -- Science. 2014 Sep 5;345(6201):1177-80. doi: 10.1126/science.1254961.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Author address: 〈/span〉College of Earth, Ocean, and Atmospheric Sciences, Oregon State University, Corvallis, OR 97331, USA. buizertc@science.oregonstate.edu. ; Centre for Ice and Climate, Niels Bohr Institute, University of Copenhagen, Denmark. Institute of Arctic and Alpine Research, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO 80309, USA. ; Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California-San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093, USA. ; Center for Climatic Research, Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies, University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI 53706, USA. ; Department of Physics and Physical Oceanography, Memorial University, St. John's, Canada. ; Division of Climate and Environmental Physics, Physics Institute and Oeschger Centre for Climate Change Research, University of Bern, Bern, Switzerland. ; College of Earth, Ocean, and Atmospheric Sciences, Oregon State University, Corvallis, OR 97331, USA. ; Centre for Ice and Climate, Niels Bohr Institute, University of Copenhagen, Denmark. ; Laboratoire des Sciences du Climat et de l'Environnement, Institut Pierre Simon Laplace (UMR CEA-CNRS-UVSQ 8212), Gif-sur-Yvette, France. ; Institute of Arctic and Alpine Research, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO 80309, USA. ; Center for Climatic Research, Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies, University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI 53706, USA. Laboratory for Climate and Ocean-Atmosphere Studies, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China. ; Climate and Global Dynamics Division, National Center for Atmospheric Research, Boulder, CO 80307, USA.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Record origin:〈/span〉 〈a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25190795" target="_blank"〉PubMed〈/a〉
Keywords:
*Climate Change
;
Computer Simulation
;
Freezing
;
Greenland
;
*Ice Cover
;
Models, Theoretical
;
Oxygen Isotopes/analysis
;
*Temperature
Print ISSN:
0036-8075
Electronic ISSN:
1095-9203
Topics:
Biology
,
Chemistry and Pharmacology
,
Computer Science
,
Medicine
,
Natural Sciences in General
,
Physics
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