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700,000 years of tropical Andean glaciation

Authors :
Rodbell, D. T.
Hatfield, R. G.
Abbott, M. B.
Chen, C. Y.
Woods, A.
Stoner, J. S.
McGee, D.
Tapia, P. M.
Bush, M.
Valero-Garcés, B. L.
Lehmann, S. B.
Mark, S. Z.
Weidhaas, N. C.
Hillman, A. L.
Larsen, D. J.
Delgado, G.
Katz, S. A.
Solada, K. E.
Morey, A. E.
Finkenbinder, M.
Valencia, B.
Rozas-Davila, A.
Wattrus, N.
Colman, S. M.
Bustamante, M. G.
Kück, J.
Pierdominici, S.
Source :
Nature; July 2022, Vol. 607 Issue: 7918 p301-306, 6p
Publication Year :
2022

Abstract

Our understanding of the climatic teleconnections that drove ice-age cycles has been limited by a paucity of well-dated tropical records of glaciation that span several glacial–interglacial intervals. Glacial deposits offer discrete snapshots of glacier extent but cannot provide the continuous records required for detailed interhemispheric comparisons. By contrast, lakes located within glaciated catchments can provide continuous archives of upstream glacial activity, but few such records extend beyond the last glacial cycle. Here a piston core from Lake Junín in the uppermost Amazon basin provides the first, to our knowledge, continuous, independently dated archive of tropical glaciation spanning 700,000 years. We find that tropical glaciers tracked changes in global ice volume and followed a clear approximately 100,000-year periodicity. An enhancement in the extent of tropical Andean glaciers relative to global ice volume occurred between 200,000 and 400,000 years ago, during sustained intervals of regionally elevated hydrologic balance that modified the regular approximately 23,000-year pacing of monsoon-driven precipitation. Millennial-scale variations in the extent of tropical Andean glaciers during the last glacial cycle were driven by variations in regional monsoon strength that were linked to temperature perturbations in Greenland ice cores1; these interhemispheric connections may have existed during previous glacial cycles.

Details

Language :
English
ISSN :
00280836 and 14764687
Volume :
607
Issue :
7918
Database :
Supplemental Index
Journal :
Nature
Publication Type :
Periodical
Accession number :
ejs60369849
Full Text :
https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-022-04873-0