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Science 22 December 2000:
Vol. 290. no. 5500, pp. 2288 - 2291
DOI: 10.1126/science.290.5500.2288
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Reports

Upwelling Intensification As Part of the Pliocene-Pleistocene Climate Transition

Jeremy R. Marlow,1* Carina B. Lange,2 Gerold Wefer,3 Antoni Rosell-Melé4

A deep-sea sediment core underlying the Benguela upwelling system off southwest Africa provides a continuous time series of sea surface temperature (SST) for the past 4.5 million years. Our results indicate that temperatures in the region have declined by about 10°C since 3.2 million years ago. Records of paleoproductivity suggest that this cooling was associated with an increase in wind-driven upwelling tied to a shift from relatively stable global warmth during the mid-Pliocene to the high-amplitude glacial-interglacial cycles of the late Quaternary. These observations imply that Atlantic Ocean surface water circulation was radically different during the mid-Pliocene.

1 Department of Fossil Fuels and Environmental Geochemistry, Drummond Building, University of Newcastle, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE1 7RU, UK.
2 Geosciences Research Division, Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California at San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093, USA.
3 Department of Earth Sciences (FB-5), University of Bremen, Postfach 330440, 28334 Bremen, Germany.
4 Department of Geography, University of Durham, Durham, DH1 3LE,UK.
*   To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: J.R.Marlow{at}ncl.ac.uk

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