Millennial and orbital scale variability of the South American Monsoon during the penultimate glacial period.

ABSTRACT: The presence of large, rapid climate oscillations is the most prominent feature of the Earth's last glacial period. These oscillations are observed throughout the Northern Hemisphere and into the Southern Hemisphere tropics. Whether similar oscillations are typical of prior glacial periods, however, has not been well established. Here, we present results of a study of the South American Summer Monsoon system that covers nearly the entire penultimate glacial period, from 195 to 135 ky BP. We use a well-dated, high-resolution (~50 y) time series of oxygen isotopes to show that the precession of the earth's orbit is the primary control on monsoon intensity. After removing the precession signal we observe millennial oscillations that are very similar in amplitude and structure to the Dansgaard

SUBMITTER: Burns SJ 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6362059 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature