Dynamical Response of the Tropical Pacific Ocean to Solar Forcing During the Early Holocene

Summary, in English

We present a high-resolution magnesium/calcium proxy record of Holocene sea surface temperature (SST) from off the west coast of Baja California Sur, Mexico, a region where interannual SST variability is dominated today by the influence of the El Nino-Southern Oscillation (ENSO). Temperatures were lowest during the early to middle Holocene, consistent with documented eastern equatorial Pacific cooling and numerical model simulations of orbital forcing into a La Nina-like state at that time. The early Holocene SSTs were also characterized by millennial-scale fluctuations that correlate with cosmogenic nuclide proxies of solar variability, with inferred solar minima corresponding to El Nino-like (warm) conditions, in apparent agreement with the theoretical "ocean dynamical thermostat" response of ENSO to exogenous radiative forcing.

• Author: Thomas M. Marchitto; Raimund Muscheler; Joseph D. Ortiz; Jose D. Carriquiry; Alexander van Geen
• Department/s: Quaternary Sciences; MERGE: ModElling the Regional and Global Earth system
• Publishing year: 2010
• Language: English
• Pages: 1378-1381
• Publication/Series: Science
• Volume: 330
• Issue: 6009
• Links: http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.1194887
• Document type: Journal article
• Publisher: American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS)
• Topic: Geology
• Status: Published
• ISBN/ISSN/Other: ISSN: 1095-9203