Articles | Volume 13, issue 6
https://doi.org/10.5194/cp-13-729-2017
https://doi.org/10.5194/cp-13-729-2017
Research article
 | 
30 Jun 2017
Research article |  | 30 Jun 2017

Regional seesaw between the North Atlantic and Nordic Seas during the last glacial abrupt climate events

Mélanie Wary, Frédérique Eynaud, Didier Swingedouw, Valérie Masson-Delmotte, Jens Matthiessen, Catherine Kissel, Jena Zumaque, Linda Rossignol, and Jean Jouzel

Abstract. Dansgaard–Oeschger oscillations constitute one of the most enigmatic features of the last glacial cycle. Their cold atmospheric phases have been commonly associated with cold sea-surface temperatures and expansion of sea ice in the North Atlantic and adjacent seas. Here, based on dinocyst analyses from the 48–30 ka interval of four sediment cores from the northern Northeast Atlantic and southern Norwegian Sea, we provide direct and quantitative evidence of a regional paradoxical seesaw pattern: cold Greenland and North Atlantic phases coincide with warmer sea-surface conditions and shorter seasonal sea-ice cover durations in the Norwegian Sea as compared to warm phases. Combined with additional palaeorecords and multi-model hosing simulations, our results suggest that during cold Greenland phases, reduced Atlantic meridional overturning circulation and cold North Atlantic sea-surface conditions were accompanied by the subsurface propagation of warm Atlantic waters that re-emerged in the Nordic Seas and provided moisture towards Greenland summit.

Download
Short summary
The last glacial period was punctuated by abrupt climatic variations, whose cold atmospheric phases have been commonly associated with cold sea-surface temperatures and expansion of sea ice in the North Atlantic and adjacent seas. Here we provide direct evidence of a regional paradoxical see-saw pattern: cold Greenland and North Atlantic phases coincide with warmer sea-surface conditions and shorter seasonal sea-ice cover durations in the Norwegian Sea as compared to warm phases.