231Pa/230Th evidence for a weakened but persistent Atlantic meridional overturning circulation during Heinrich Stadial 1

Louisa I. Bradtmiller (), Jerry F. McManus and Laura F. Robinson
Additional contact information
Louisa I. Bradtmiller: Macalester College
Jerry F. McManus: Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory of Columbia University
Laura F. Robinson: Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution

Nature Communications, 2014, vol. 5, issue 1, 1-8

Abstract: Abstract The strength of Atlantic meridional overturning circulation is believed to affect the climate over glacial-interglacial and millennial timescales. The marine sedimentary 231Pa/230Th ratio is a promising paleocirculation proxy, but local particle effects may bias individual reconstructions. Here we present new Atlantic sedimentary 231Pa/230Th data from the Holocene, the last glacial maximum and Heinrich Stadial 1, a period of abrupt cooling ca. 17,500 years ago. We combine our results with published data from these intervals to create a spatially distributed sedimentary 231Pa/230Th database. The data reveal a net 231Pa deficit during each period, consistent with persistent 231Pa export. In highly resolved cores, Heinrich 231Pa/230Th ratios exceed glacial ratios at nearly all depths, indicating a significant reduction, although not cessation, of overturning during Heinrich Stadial 1. These results support the inference that weakened overturning was a driver of Heinrich cooling, while suggesting that abrupt climate oscillations do not necessarily require a complete shutdown of overturning.

Date: 2014
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/ncomms6817 Abstract (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nat:natcom:v:5:y:2014:i:1:d:10.1038_ncomms6817

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/ncomms/

DOI: 10.1038/ncomms6817

Access Statistics for this article

Nature Communications is currently edited by Nathalie Le Bot, Enda Bergin and Fiona Gillespie

More articles in Nature Communications from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().