Arctic oceanic climate in late Cenozoic time
Faunal and lithologic evidence is used to reconstruct paleoceanographic events over the last 4.5 million years. The inception of perennial sea-ice cover is dated at about 0.7 million years.
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Geology topics
Y. Herman
Publications and source records attributed to Y. Herman.
Arctic palaeosalinities during late Cainozoic time
DURING the late Cainozoic, alternations between interglacial and glacial conditions, manifested by waning and waxing of continental ice sheets coincided with the rise and fall of seawater temperatures. Our palaeontological and oxygen isotope data indicate that although the major oceans and low latititude seas underwent large temperature variations, ∼ 5–10 °C, Arctic water temperatures remained near freezing point for at least the past 3 Myr, the time interval represented by the longest studied cores. We have determined palaeotemperatures from the ratio of left to right coiling Globigerina pachyderma 1–3 and calculated palaeosalinities using the oxygen isotope palaeotemperature expression of Epstein et al. 4 .
Nature↗
Arctic paleo-oceanography in late Cenozoic time
Sediment cores from the Arctic Ocean yield significant faunal and lithologic evidence of alternating cold and milder periods for the last 6 million years. Although high-latitude continental glaciation commenced prior to 6 million years ago, the Arctic Ocean remained free of permanent pack ice up to approximately 0.7 million years ago, after which successive ice-covered and ice-free conditions existed.
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