No abstract

Two well-dated ca. Holocene-long sedimentary sequences from deepest parts of Lake Bourget provide new insights onto the evolution of erosion patterns at a regional scale in NW European Alps. The combination of high resolution geochemistry -XRF core scanning, calibrated by 150 punctual measurements -and isotope geochemistry (Nd) of the terrigenous fraction permitted the reconstruction not only of the intensity, but also the type (physical erosion vs. chemical weathering) and the location (Prealpine massifs vs. High Crystalline massifs) of dominant erosion processes. Those data point the persistency of weak erosion fluxes from 9600 to 5500 cal. BP due both to a dry climate and the growing sheltering effect of soils that rapidly progressed between 9600 and 8000 cal. BP. Soils then reached a steady state before being destabilised around 4400 cal. BP, probably in response to human impact. The human impact then reached a sufficient intensity to change erosion patterns at a regional scale, but did not result in a significant increase of the regional terrigenous flux. The following enhancement of erosion processes occurred around 2700 cal. BP. It was first paced by changing climatic conditions, but probably reinforced by human impact during Late Iron AgeAntiquity period. Over the long-term trend, the Lake Bourget record pinpoints an evolution of paleohydrological conditions in the Alps dominated by dry conditions from 9500 to 4400 cal. BP and a subsequent drift toward wetter conditions that culminated during the so-called Little Ice Age (ca. 1350(ca. -1900. In such a context the current dry conditions in European Alps appear out-of-trend. At Arnaud et al., Holocene alpine erosion patterns 2 high resolution, 17 periods of enhanced hydrological activity highlight the rapid climatic changes that are typical of the Holocene.

No abstract

International audienceWe review the scientific efforts over the last decades to reconstruct erosion from continuous alpine lake sediment records. We focused both on methodological issues, showing the growing importance of non-destructive high resolution approaches (XRF core-scanner) as well as progresses in the understanding of processes leading to the creation of an “erosion signal” in lakes. We distinguish “continuous records” from “event-records”. Both provide complementary information but need to be studied with different approaches. Continuous regionally-relevant records proved to be particularly pertinent to document regional erosion patterns throughout the Holocene, in particular applying the source to sink approach. Event-based approaches demonstrated and took advantage of the strong non-linearity of sediment transport in high altitude catchment areas. This led to flood frequency and intensity reconstructions, highlighting the influence of climate change upon flood dynamics in the mountain.The combination of different record types, both in terms of location (high vs. low elevation), sedimentology (high vs. low terrigenous contribution) and significance (local vs. regional) is one of the main outputs of this paper. It allows the establishment of comprehensive histories of NW French Alps erosion, but also and consequently, soil dynamics and hydrological patterns throughout the Holocene. We also discuss the influence of glacier dynamics, one of the major agents of erosion in the Alps.A major feature is the growing human influence upon erosion at a local scale since at least the middle of the Bronze Age (3500 cal. BP). However and according to the regional record from Lake Bourget, only few periods of rising erosion at local scales generated a regional record that can be discriminated from wetter climatic periods. Among them, the period between 200 BCE and 400 AD appeared to be marked by a generalised rise in human-triggered erosion at local scales in the northern French Alps.This review highlights the importance of modern high-resolution and interdisciplinary studies of lake sediments, in order to better understand the complex relationships between humans, climate and the Earth system in general. We strongly argue that regional integration of data is now required to move a step further. Such an integration is easier with cost- and time-effective methods as well as after a better definition of approaches and their limits. This should lead to a stronger collaboration between paleo-data producers and modellers in the near future

No abstract

The sulfur biogeochemical cycle plays a key role in regulating Earth's surface redox through diverse abiotic and biological reactions that have distinctive stable isotopic fractionations. As such, variations in the sulfur isotopic composition (δS) of sedimentary sulfate and sulfide phases over Earth history can be used to infer substantive changes to the Earth's surface environment, including the rise of atmospheric oxygen. Such inferences assume that individual δS records reflect temporal changes in the global sulfur cycle; this assumption may be well grounded for sulfate-bearing minerals but is less well established for pyrite-based records. Here, we investigate alternative controls on the sedimentary sulfur isotopic composition of marine pyrite by examining a 300-m drill core of Mediterranean sediments deposited over the past 500,000 y and spanning the last five glacial-interglacial periods. Because this interval is far shorter than the residence time of marine sulfate, any change in the sulfur isotopic record preserved in pyrite (δS) necessarily corresponds to local environmental changes. The stratigraphic variations (>76‰) in the isotopic data reported here are among the largest ever observed in pyrite, and are in phase with glacial-interglacial sea level and temperature changes. In this case, the dominant control appears to be glacial-interglacial variations in sedimentation rates. These results suggest that there exist important but previously overlooked depositional controls on sedimentary sulfur isotope records, especially associated with intervals of substantial sea level change. This work provides an important perspective on the origin of variability in such records and suggests meaningful paleoenvironmental information can be derived from pyrite δS records.

International audienceFlood hazard is expected to increase in the context of global warming. However, long time-series of climate and gauge data at high-elevation are too sparse to assess reliably the rate of recurrence of such events in mountain areas. Here paleolimnological techniques were used to assess the evolution of frequency and magnitude of flash flood events in the North-western European Alps since the Little Ice Age (LIA). The aim was to document a possible effect of the post-19th century global warming on torrential floods frequency and magnitude. Altogether 56 flood deposits were detected from grain size and geochemical measurements performed on gravity cores taken in the proglacial Lake Blanc (2170 ma.s.l., Belledonne Massif, NW French Alps). The age model relies on radiometric dating (137Cs and 241Am), historic lead contamination and the correlation of major flood- and earthquaketriggered deposits, with recognized occurrences in historical written archives. The resulting flood calendar spans the last ca 270 years (AD 1740-AD 2007). The magnitude of flood events was inferred from the accumulated sediment mass per flood event and compared with reconstructed or homogenized datasets of precipitation, temperature and glacier variations. Whereas the decennial flood frequency seems to be independent of seasonal precipitation, a relationship with summer temperature fluctuations can be observed at decadal timescales. Most of the extreme flood events took place since the beginning of the 20th century with the strongest occurring in 2005. Our record thus suggests climate warming is favouring the occurrence of high magnitude torrential flood events in high-altitude catchments

International audienceWe present a revised method for the determination of concentrations of rare earth (REE) and other trace elements (Y, Sc, Zr, Ba, Hf, Th) in geological samples. Our analytical procedure involves sample digestion using alkaline fusion (NaOH-Na2O2) after addition of a Tm spike, co-precipitation on iron hydroxides, and measurement by sector field-inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry (SF-ICP-MS). The procedure was tested successfully for various rock types (i.e., basalt, ultramafic rock, sediment, soil, granite), including rocks with low trace element abundances (sub ng g−1). Results obtained for a series of nine geological reference materials (BIR-1, BCR-2, UB-N, JP-1, AC-E, MA-N, MAG-1, GSMS-2, GSS-4) are in reasonable agreement with published working values