ALBERT

Description: The reduction in sea ice along the SE Greenland coast during the last century has severely impacted ice-rafting to this area. In order to reconstruct ice-rafting and oceanographic conditions in the area of Denmark Strait during the last ~150 years, we conducted a multiproxy study on three short (20 cm) sediment cores from outer Kangerdlugssuaq Trough (~300 m water depth). The proxy-based data obtained have been compared with historical and instrumental data to gain a better understanding of the ice sheet-ocean interactions in the area. A robust chronology has been developed based on 210Pb and 137Cs measurements on core PO175GKC#9 (~66.2°N, 32°W) and expanded to the two adjacent cores based on correlations between calcite weight percent records. Our proxy records include sea-ice and phytoplankton biomarkers, and a variety of mineralogical determinations based on the 〈2 mm sediment fraction, including identification with quantitative x-ray diffraction, ice-rafted debris counts on the 63-150 µm sand fraction, and source identifications based on the composition of Fe oxides in the 45-250 µm fraction. A multivariate statistical analysis indicated significant correlations between our proxy records and historical data, especially with the mean annual temperature data from Stykkishólmur (Iceland) and the storis index (historical observations of sea-ice export via the East Greenland Current). In particular, the biological proxies (calcite weight percent, IP25, and total organic carbon %) showed significant linkage with the storis index. Our records show two distinct intervals in the recent history of the SE Greenland coast. The first of these (ad 1850-1910) shows predominantly perennial sea-ice conditions in the area, while the second (ad 1910-1990) shows more seasonally open water conditions.

Description: Geophysical data from the Kangerlussuaq Trough, E Greenland (Dowdeswell et al., 2010; Stein, 1996), and from the West Iceland shelf (Syvitski et al., 1999) indicate that there are sites where pre Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) sediments exist, but no such sites have been successfully cored. However, a significant number of cores have been recovered that penetrate a basal diamicton, sometimes containing shells and foraminifera, and which are overlain by glacial marine sediments rich in ice rafted debris (IRD) (Jennings et al., 2000; Olafsdottir, 2004). At the LGM, reconstructions and marine field data (Andrews, 2008; Andrews et al., 1998, 2000; Dunhill, 2005; Funder et al., 2004; Hubbard et al., 2006; Vasskog et al., 2015) indicate that the Iceland and Greenland ice sheets were terminating at their shelf breaks with deposition on the slopes above the Denmark Strait. Active sediment deposition ceased on the Kangerlussuaq Trough Mouth Fan (KTMF) ca. 15.3 ka 14C BP (Andrews et al., 1998; Dunhill, 2005) and retreat to the present coastline occurred prior to deposition of the Vedde tephra (Jennings et al., 2006). There is strong evidence that a major change in deep-water circulation at ~15 cal ka BP resulted in abrupt warming at the onset of the Bølling/Allerød (B/A) interstadial (Thiagarajan et al., 2014; Thornalley et al., 2011). Syvitski et al (1999) and Norddahl and Ingolfsson (2015) argued that the Iceland Ice Sheet retreated rapidly during this time, driven by a rapid rise in relative sea level. Jennings et al. (2006) also presented radiocarbon evidence from marine cores for a rapid retreat of the Greenland Ice Sheet along Kangerlussuaq Trough (KT, Fig. 1).

Description: The development of various combinative methods for Arctic sea ice reconstruction using the sympagic highly-branched isoprenoid IP25 in conjunction with pelagic biomarkers has often facilitated more detailed descriptions of sea ice conditions than using IP25 alone. Here, we investigated the complementary application of the Phytoplankton-IP25 index (PIP25) and a recently proposed Classification Tree (CT) model for describing shifts in sea ice conditions to assess the consistency of both methods. Based on biomarker data from three downcore records from the Barents Sea spanning millennial timescales, we showcase apparent and potential limitations of both approaches, and provide recommendations for their identification or prevention. Both methods provided generally consistent outcomes and, within the studied cores, captured abrupt shifts in sea ice regimes, such as those evident during the Younger Dryas, as well as more gradual trends in sea ice conditions during the Holocene. The most significant discrepancies occurred during periods of highly unstable climate change, such as those characteristic of the Younger Dryas-Holocene transition. Such intervals of increased discrepancy were identifiable by significant changes of HBI distributions and correlations to values not observed in proximal surface sediments. We suggest that periods of highly-fluctuating climate that are not represented in modern settings may hinder the performance and complementary application of PIP25 and CT-based methods, and that data visualisation techniques should be employed to identify such occurrences in downcore records. Additionally, due to the reliance of both methods on biomarker distributions, we emphasise the importance of accurate and consistent biomarker quantification for future investigations.

Description: Holocene paleoceanographic reconstructions along the North Iceland Shelf have employed a variety of sea surface temperature and sea ice proxies. However, these surface proxies tend to have a seasonal bias toward spring/summer and thus only provide a discrete snapshot of surface conditions during one season. Furthermore, sea surface temperature proxies can be influenced by additional confounding variables resulting in markedly different Holocene temperature reconstructions. Here, we expand Iceland's marine paleoclimate toolkit with TEX86 L: a temperature proxy based on the distribution of archaeal glycerol dibiphytanyl glycerol tetraether (GDGT) lipids. We develop a local Icelandic calibration from 21 surface sediment samples covering a wide environmental gradient across Iceland's insular shelves. Locally calibrated GDGT results demonstrate that (1) TEX86 L reflects winter subsurface (0-200 m) temperatures on the North Iceland Shelf and (2) our calibration produces more realistic temperature estimates with substantially lower uncertainty (S.E. ±4 °C) over global calibrations. We then apply this new calibration to a high‐resolution marine sediment core (last millennium) collected from the central NIS with age control constrained by 14C‐dated mollusks. To test the veracity of the GDGT subsurface temperatures, we analyze quartz and calcite wt% and a series of highly branched isoprenoid alkenes, including the sea ice biomarker IP25, from the same core. The sediment records demonstrate that the development of thick sea ice during the Little Ice Age warmed the subsurface due to winter insulation. Importantly, this observation reflects a seasonal component of the sea ice/ocean feedback to be considered for the nonlinear cooling of the Little Ice Age in and around Iceland.