Early warning signals of the termination of the African Humid Period(s)

Martin H. Trauth (), Asfawossen Asrat, Markus L. Fischer, Peter O. Hopcroft, Verena Foerster, Stefanie Kaboth-Bahr, Karin Kindermann, Henry F. Lamb, Norbert Marwan, Mark A. Maslin, Frank Schaebitz and Paul J. Valdes
Additional contact information
Martin H. Trauth: Institute of Geosciences
Asfawossen Asrat: Department of Mining and Geological Engineering
Markus L. Fischer: Institute of Geosciences
Peter O. Hopcroft: Earth & Environmental Sciences
Verena Foerster: Institute of Geography Education
Stefanie Kaboth-Bahr: Institute of Geological Sciences
Karin Kindermann: Institute of Prehistoric Archaeology
Henry F. Lamb: Department of Geography and Earth Sciences
Norbert Marwan: Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, Member of the Leibniz Association
Mark A. Maslin: Geography Department
Frank Schaebitz: Institute of Geography Education
Paul J. Valdes: School of Geographical Sciences

Nature Communications, 2024, vol. 15, issue 1, 1-9

Abstract: Abstract The transition from a humid green Sahara to today’s hyperarid conditions in northern Africa ~5.5 thousand years ago shows the dramatic environmental change to which human societies were exposed and had to adapt to. In this work, we show that in the 620,000-year environmental record from the Chew Bahir basin in the southern Ethiopian Rift, with its decadal resolution, this one thousand year long transition is particularly well documented, along with 20–80 year long droughts, recurring every ~160 years, as possible early warnings. Together with events of extreme wetness at the end of the transition, these droughts form a pronounced climate “flickering”, which can be simulated in climate models and is also present in earlier climate transitions in the Chew Bahir environmental record, indicating that transitions with flickering are characteristic of this region.

Date: 2024
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DOI: 10.1038/s41467-024-47921-1

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