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Paleoclimatic Investigation of a Late Pleistocene Caribbean Deep-Sea Core: Comparison of Isotopic and Faunal Methods1
- John Imbrie, Jan van Donk, Nilva G. Kipp
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- Journal:
- Quaternary Research / Volume 3 / Issue 1 / June 1973
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 20 January 2017, pp. 10-38
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A simplified and more accurate version of the quantitative paleoenvironmental method proposed by Imbrie and Kipp (1971) is described, which is based on untransformed rather than transformed species per cent data. The method yields faunal indices (Ts, Tw, S), useful both as objective measures of paleontological properties and as estimates of Pleistocene sea-surface summer and winter temperatures (Ts, Tw) and salinity (S). Similarly, the oxygen-isotope method yields objective measurements of δ O18, useful stratigraphically and as indications of past changes in isotopic water composition and temperature.
Laboratory errors of the two methods have about the same magnitude relative to ranges observed in V12-122. Accuracy of faunal indices as estimates of oceanic conditions is evaluated by study of modern oceanographic data and sea-bed samples. Under favorable conditions, accuracy is apparently limited primarily by the degree of ecological control exercised by the estimated parameter. Accuracy of the isotopic paleotemperature estimates is limited primarily by uncertainty as to the magnitude of the water-correction term in the isotope equation, a value which combines global ice-volume and local evaporation-precipitation effects.
Curves of δ O13 and S in V12-122 record all or part of seven major climatic cycles, and display a fundamental periodicity of about 85,000 years. Ts and Tw curves show small but significant differences: two phase shifts in estimated temperature minima, and a long-term increasing trend.
Amplitude-frequency histograms of Tw and δ O18 indicate that only two percent of the time during the past 450,000 years have Caribbean temperatures been as warm and isotopic ratios as low as they are today.
A comparison of the magnitude of δ O18 change (2.2%.) during the shift from late-glacial to post-glacial times, with that of the faunally estimated change in average temperature (2.2°C), provides a basis for estimating the associated change in isotopic water composition (1.8%.) by back-calculation in the isotope equation. At least 0.4%. of this change in A is attributed to an evaporation-precipitation effect, and the balance (≤1.4%.) to an icevolume effect.
Isotopic and faunal methods monitor different responses to global climatic change. Used in conjunction, they provide deeper insights into the past than either could achieve alone.
The Last Interglacial Ocean
- Rose Marie L. Cline, James D. Hays, Warren L. Prell, William F. Ruddiman, Ted C. Moore, Nilva G. Kipp, Barbara E. Molfino, George H. Denton, Terence J. Hughes, William L. Balsam, Charlotte A. Brunner, Jean-Claude Duplessy, Ann G. Esmay, James L. Fastook, John Imbrie, Lloyd D. Keigwin, Thomas B. Kellogg, Andrew McIntyre, Robley K. Matthews, Alan C. Mix, Joseph J. Morley, Nicholas J. Shackleton, S. Stephen Streeter, Peter R. Thompson
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- Journal:
- Quaternary Research / Volume 21 / Issue 2 / February 1984
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 20 January 2017, pp. 123-224
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The final effort of the CLIMAP project was a study of the last interglaciation, a time of minimum ice volume some 122,000 yr ago coincident with the Substage 5e oxygen isotopic minimum. Based on detailed oxygen isotope analyses and biotic census counts in 52 cores across the world ocean, last interglacial sea-surface temperatures (SST) were compared with those today. There are small SST departures in the mid-latitude North Atlantic (warmer) and the Gulf of Mexico (cooler). The eastern boundary currents of the South Atlantic and Pacific oceans are marked by large SST anomalies in individual cores, but their interpretations are precluded by no-analog problems and by discordancies among estimates from different biotic groups. In general, the last interglacial ocean was not significantly different from the modern ocean. The relative sequencing of ice decay versus oceanic warming on the Stage 6/5 oxygen isotopic transition and of ice growth versus oceanic cooling on the Stage 5e/5d transition was also studied. In most of the Southern Hemisphere, the oceanic response marked by the biotic census counts preceded (led) the global ice-volume response marked by the oxygen-isotope signal by several thousand years. The reverse pattern is evident in the North Atlantic Ocean and the Gulf of Mexico, where the oceanic response lagged that of global ice volume by several thousand years. As a result, the very warm temperatures associated with the last interglaciation were regionally diachronous by several thousand years. These regional lead-lag relationships agree with those observed on other transitions and in long-term phase relationships; they cannot be explained simply as artifacts of bioturbational translations of the original signals.
Comparison of Foraminiferal, Coccolithophorid, and Radiolarian Paleotemperature Equations: Assemblage Coherency and Estimate Concordancy1
- Barbara Molfino, Nilva G. Kipp, Joseph J. Morley
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- Journal:
- Quaternary Research / Volume 17 / Issue 3 / May 1982
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 20 January 2017, pp. 279-313
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The Imbrie-Kipp method of paleotemperature estimation is rigorously tested by comparing Atlantic temperature equations independently derived from the microfossils of three biotic groups: the Foraminifera, Coccolithophorida, and Radiolaria. This method consists of two steps: factor analysis of the modern sea-bed data of the individual groups which resolves discrete biogeographic assemblages and regression analysis of the modern assemblage data with observed sea-surface temperature data to obtain paleotemperature equations. Assemblage biogeography shows a simple subdivision into warm (low latitude) and cold (high latitude) for all biotic groups. Between biotic groups there is greater similarity among high-latitude assemblages than low-latitude ones. Correlating the assemblage data with observed sea-surface temperatures to produce temperature distribution patterns shows differences of less than 2°C in their optimum and critical temperatures. Regression analysis produced accurate temperature equations for each biotic group, all with standard errors of estimate of less than or equal to 2°C. Multiple correlation coefficients were all greater than 0.970. Applying these equations to two multiple biotic data sets (the modern and ice-age sea-bed data) and comparing their temperature estimates using the standard error pooled, shows over 87% concordancy for both data sets. Unlike the modern data, the discordancy among temperature estimates of the ice-age data shows a distinct geographic distribution; its cause is believed to be oceanographic, a difference in the water-mass structure between the modern and ice-age ocean.