Evidence for massive methane hydrate destabilization during the penultimate interglacial warming.

ABSTRACT: The stability of widespread methane hydrates in shallow subsurface sediments of the marine continental margins is sensitive to temperature increases experienced by upper intermediate waters. Destabilization of methane hydrates and ensuing release of methane would produce climatic feedbacks amplifying and accelerating global warming. Hence, improved assessment of ongoing intermediate water warming is crucially important, especially that resulting from a weakening of Atlantic meridional overturning circulation (AMOC). Our study provides an independent paleoclimatic perspective by reconstructing the thermal structure and imprint of methane oxidation throughout a water column of 1,300 m. We studied a sediment sequence from the eastern equatorial Atlantic (Gulf of Guinea), a region containing a

SUBMITTER: Weldeab S 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9436375 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature