Note to users. If you're seeing this message, it means that your browser cannot find this page's style/presentation instructions -- or possibly that you are using a browser that does not support current Web standards. Find out more about why this message is appearing, and what you can do to make your experience of our site the best it can be.

Science 29 October 1999:
Vol. 286. no. 5441, pp. 930 - 934
DOI: 10.1126/science.286.5441.930
Prev | Table of Contents | Next

Reports

Abrupt Climate Change at the End of the Last Glacial Period Inferred from Trapped Air in Polar Ice

Jeffrey P. Severinghaus, 1 Edward J. Brook 2

The last glacial period was terminated by an abrupt warming event in the North Atlantic ~15,000 years before the present, and warming events of similar age have been reported from low latitudes. Understanding the mechanism of this termination requires that the precise relative timing of abrupt climate warming in the tropics versus the North Atlantic be known. Nitrogen and argon isotopes in trapped air in Greenland ice show that the Greenland Summit warmed 9 ± 3°C over a period of several decades, beginning 14,672 years ago. Atmospheric methane concentrations rose abruptly over a ~50-year period and began their increase 20 to 30 years after the onset of the abrupt Greenland warming. These data suggest that tropical climate became warmer or wetter (or both) ~20 to 80 years after the onset of Greenland warming, supporting a North Atlantic rather than a tropical trigger for the climate event.

1 Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California, San Diego, 9500 Gilman Drive, La Jolla, CA 92037, USA. E-mail: jseveringhaus{at}ucsd.edu
2 Department of Geology, Washington State University, 14204 NE Salmon Creek Avenue, Vancouver, WA 98686, USA. E-mail: brook{at}vancouver.wsu.edu

Read the Full Text


THIS ARTICLE HAS BEEN CITED BY OTHER ARTICLES:
The impacts of climate change on the annual cycles of birds.
C. Carey (2009)
Phil Trans R Soc B 364, 3321-3330
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
What Drives Climate Flip-Flops?.
A. Timmermann and L. Menviel (2009)
Science 325, 273-274
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Cosmogenic 10Be chronology of the last deglaciation of western Ireland, and implications for sensitivity of the Irish Ice Sheet to climate change.
J. Clark, A. M. McCabe, C. Schnabel, P. U. Clark, S. McCarron, S. P.H.T. Freeman, C. Maden, and S. Xu (2009)
Geological Society of America Bulletin 121, 3-16
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
South Atlantic interocean exchange as the trigger for the Bolling warm event.
C. M. Chiessi, S. Mulitza, A. Paul, J. Patzold, J. Groeneveld, and G. Wefer (2008)
Geology 36, 919-922
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
High-Resolution Greenland Ice Core Data Show Abrupt Climate Change Happens in Few Years.
J. P. Steffensen, K. K. Andersen, M. Bigler, H. B. Clausen, D. Dahl-Jensen, H. Fischer, K. Goto-Azuma, M. Hansson, S. J. Johnsen, J. Jouzel, et al. (2008)
Science 321, 680-684
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Methane bubbling from northern lakes: present and future contributions to the global methane budget.
K. M Walter, L. C Smith, and F Stuart Chapin III (2007)
Phil Trans R Soc A 365, 1657-1676
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Constraining past global tropospheric methane budgets with carbon and hydrogen isotope ratios in ice.
M. Whiticar and H. Schaefer (2007)
Phil Trans R Soc A 365, 1793-1828
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Inaugural Article: Climatically driven emissions of hydrocarbons from marine sediments during deglaciation.
T. M. Hill, J. P. Kennett, D. L. Valentine, Z. Yang, C. M. Reddy, R. K. Nelson, R. J. Behl, C. Robert, and L. Beaufort (2006)
PNAS 103, 13570-13574
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Near-synchronous interhemispheric termination of the last glacial maximum in mid-latitudes..
J. M. Schaefer, G. H. Denton, D. J. A. Barrell, S. Ivy-Ochs, P. W. Kubik, B. G. Andersen, F. M. Phillips, T. V. Lowell, and C. Schluchter (2006)
Science 312, 1510-1513
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
GRIP Deuterium Excess Reveals Rapid and Orbital-Scale Changes in Greenland Moisture Origin.
V. Masson-Delmotte, J. Jouzel, A. Landais, M. Stievenard, S. J. Johnsen, J. W. C. White, M. Werner, A. Sveinbjornsdottir, and K. Fuhrer (2005)
Science 309, 118-121
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
How Physiological Methods and Concepts Can Be Useful in Conservation Biology.
C. Carey (2005)
Integr. Comp. Biol. 45, 4-11
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Abrupt Tropical Vegetation Response to Rapid Climate Changes.
K. A. Hughen, T. I. Eglinton, L. Xu, and M. Makou (2004)
Science 304, 1955-1959
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Siberian Peatlands a Net Carbon Sink and Global Methane Source Since the Early Holocene.
L. C. Smith, G. M. MacDonald, A. A. Velichko, D. W. Beilman, O. K. Borisova, K. E. Frey, K. V. Kremenetski, and Y. Sheng (2004)
Science 303, 353-356
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Synchroneity of Tropical and High-Latitude Atlantic Temperatures over the Last Glacial Termination.
D. W. Lea, D. K. Pak, L. C. Peterson, and K. A. Hughen (2003)
Science 301, 1361-1364
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Indian Ocean Climate and an Absolute Chronology over Dansgaard/Oeschger Events 9 to 13.
S. J. Burns, D. Fleitmann, A. Matter, J. Kramers, and A. A. Al-Subbary (2003)
Science 301, 1365-1367
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Does the Trigger for Abrupt Climate Change Reside in the Ocean or in the Atmosphere?.
W. S. Broecker (2003)
Science 300, 1519-1522
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Timing of Atmospheric CO2 and Antarctic Temperature Changes Across Termination III.
N. Caillon, J. P. Severinghaus, J. Jouzel, J.-M. Barnola, J. Kang, and V. Y. Lipenkov (2003)
Science 299, 1728-1731
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Synchroneity of meltwater pulse 1a and the Bolling warming: New evidence from the South China Sea.
M. Kienast, T.J.J. Hanebuth, C. Pelejero, and S. Steinke (2003)
Geology 31, 67-70
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Comment: COMMENT.
M.D. Max and W.P. Dillon (2002)
Geology 30, 762-763
   Full Text »    PDF »
Late Quaternary paleohydrology of the central Atacama Desert (lat 22{degrees}-24{degrees}S), Chile.
J. A. Rech, J. Quade, and J. L. Betancourt (2002)
Geological Society of America Bulletin 114, 334-348
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Vegetation invasions into absolute desert: A 45;th000 yr rodent midden record from the Calama-Salar de Atacama basins, northern Chile (lat 22{degrees}-24{degrees}S).
C. Latorre, J. L. Betancourt, K. A. Rylander, and J. Quade (2002)
Geological Society of America Bulletin 114, 349-366
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Noble Gases in Lakes and Ground Waters.
R. Kipfer, W. Aeschbach-Hertig, F. Peeters, and M. Stute (2002)
Reviews in Mineralogy and Geochemistry 47, 615-700
   Full Text »    PDF »
Freshwater Forcing of Abrupt Climate Change During the Last Glaciation.
P. U. Clark, S. J. Marshall, G. K. C. Clarke, S. W. Hostetler, J. M. Licciardi, and J. T. Teller (2001)
Science 293, 283-287
   Abstract »    Full Text »
Timing of Millennial-Scale Climate Change in Antarctica and Greenland During the Last Glacial Period.
T. Blunier and E. J. Brook (2001)
Science 291, 109-112
   Abstract »    Full Text »
Oxygen- and Hydrogen-Isotopic Ratios of Water in Precipitation: Beyond Paleothermometry.
R. B. Alley, R. B. Alley, and K. M. Cuffey (2001)
Reviews in Mineralogy and Geochemistry 43, 527-553
   Full Text »    PDF »
Reconstruction of the Amazon Basin Effective Moisture Availability over the Past 14,000 Years.
M. A. Maslin and S. J. Burns (2000)
Science 290, 2285-2287
   Abstract »    Full Text »
A 22,000-Year Record of Monsoonal Precipitation from Northern Chile's Atacama Desert.
J. L. Betancourt, C. Latorre, J. A. Rech, J. Quade, and K. A. Rylander (2000)
Science 289, 1542-1546
   Abstract »    Full Text »


To Advertise     Find Products

Science. ISSN 0036-8075 (print), 1095-9203 (online)