Given still-high levels of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) susceptibility and inconsistent transmission-containing strategies, outbreaks have continued to emerge across the United States. Until effective vaccines are widely deployed, curbing COVID-19 will require carefully timed nonpharmaceutical interventions (NPIs). A COVID-19 early warning system is vital for this. Here, we evaluate digital data streams as early indicators of state-level COVID-19 activity from 1 March to 30 September 2020. We observe that increases in digital data stream activity anticipate increases in confirmed cases and deaths by 2 to 3 weeks. Confirmed cases and deaths also decrease 2 to 4 weeks after NPI implementation, as measured by anonymized, phone-derived human mobility data. We propose a means of harmonizing these data streams to identify future COVID-19 outbreaks. Our results suggest that combining disparate health and behavioral data may help identify disease activity changes weeks before observation using traditional epidemiological monitoring.

Despite having a large influence on summer insolation, climatic precession is thought to account for little variance in early Pleistocene proxies of ice volume and deep-water temperature. Various mechanisms have been suggested to account for the dearth of precession variability, including meridional insolation gradients, interhemispheric cancellation of ice-volume changes, and antiphasing between the duration and intensity of summer insolation. We employ a method termed Empirical Nonlinear Orbital Fitting (ENOF) to estimate the amplitudes of obliquity and precession forcing in early Pleistocene proxies and their respective leads or lags relative to the timing of orbital variations. Analysis of a high-resolution North Atlantic benthic δ 18 O record, comprising data from IODP sites U1308 and U1313, indicates a significantly larger precession contribution than previously recognized, with an average precession-to-obliquity amplitude ratio of 0.51 (0.30-0.76 95% confidence interval) in the rate-of-change of δ 18 O between 3 and 1 Ma. Averaged when eccentricity exceeds 0.05, this ratio rises to an average of 1.18 (0.84-1.53). Additional support for precession's importance in the early Pleistocene comes from its estimated amplitude covarying with eccentricity, analyses of other benthic δ 18 O records yielding similar orbital amplitude ratios, and use of an orbitally-independent timescale also showing significant precession. Precession in phase with Northern Hemisphere summer intensity steadily intensifies throughout the Pleistocene, in agreement with its more common identification during the late Pleistocene. A Northern Hemisphere ice sheet and energy balance model run over the early Pleistocene predicts orbital amplitudes consistent with observations when a cooling commensurate with North Atlantic sea surface temperatures is imposed. These results provide strong evidence that glaciation is influenced by climatic precession during the late Pliocene and early Pleistocene, and are consistent with hypotheses that glaciation is controlled by Northern Hemisphere summer insolation.

It is established that changes in sea level influence melt production at midocean ridges, but whether changes in melt production influence the pattern of bathymetry flanking midocean ridges has been debated on both theoretical and empirical grounds. To explore the dynamics that may give rise to a sea-level influence on bathymetry, we simulate abyssal hills using a faulting model with periodic variations in melt supply. For 100-ky melt-supply cycles, model results show that faults initiate during periods of amagmatic spreading at half-rates >2.3 cm/y and for 41-ky melt-supply cycles at half-rates >3.8 cm/y. Analysis of bathymetry across 17 midocean ridge regions shows characteristic wavelengths that closely align with the predictions from the faulting model. At intermediate-spreading ridges (half-rates >2.3 cm/y and ≤ 3.8 cm/y) abyssal hill spacing increases with spreading rate at 0.99 km/(cm/y) or 99 ky ( n = 12; 95% CI, 87 to 110 ky), and at fast-spreading ridges (half-rates >3.8 cm/y) spacing increases at 38 ky ( n = 5; 95% CI, 29 to 47 ky). Including previously published analyses of abyssal-hill spacing gives a more precise alignment with the primary periods of Pleistocene sea-level variability. Furthermore, analysis of bathymetry from fast-spreading ridges shows a highly statistically significant spectral peak ( P < 0.01) at the 1/(41-ky) period of Earth’s variations in axial tilt. Faulting models and observations both support a linkage between glacially induced sea-level change and the fabric of the sea floor over the late Pleistocene.