Long-term winter warming trend in the Siberian Arctic during the mid- to late Holocene

Abstract

Relative to the past 2,000 years 1,2 , the Arctic region has warmed significantly over the past few decades. However, the evolution of Arctic temperatures during the rest of the Holocene is less clear. Proxy reconstructions, suggest a longterm cooling trend throughout the mid-to late Holocene 3-5 , whereas climate model simulations show only minor changes or even warming [6][7][8] . Here we present a record of the oxygen isotope composition of permafrost ice wedges from the Lena River Delta in the Siberian Arctic. The isotope values, which reflect winter season temperatures, became progressively more enriched over the past 7,000 years, reaching unprecedented levels in the past five decades. This warming trend during the mid-to late Holocene is in opposition to the cooling seen in other proxy records 3,5,9. However, most of these existing proxy records are biased towards summer temperatures. We argue that the opposing trends are related to the seasonally di erent orbital forcing over this interval. Furthermore, our reconstructed trend as well as the recent maximum are consistent with the greenhouse gas forcing and climate model simulations, thus reconciling di ering estimates of Arctic and northern high-latitude temperature evolution during the Holocene.

Glacial–interglacial changes in H<sub>2</sub><sup>18</sup>O, HDO and deuterium excess – results from the fully coupled ECHAM5/MPI-OM Earth system model

“…Future in-depth analyses of our model results can help to achieve an improved interpretation of available isotope records, e.g. from speleothems or permafrost ice wedges (Meyer et al, 2015), from these regions.…”

Biome changes and their inferred climatic drivers in northern and eastern continental Asia at selected times since 40 cal ka bp

“…A mismatch between pollen-based and modelled biomes in central Yakutia during the Holocene probably originates from a vegetation-climate disequilibrium related to complex interactions between climate, permafrost, fire, and vegetation. (Cheng et al 2016); Alkenone-derived sea-surface temperature (SST) from deep-sea cores SU8118 and MD952042 (Pailler and Bard 2002); Mg/Ca-derived SST from core ODP-984 (Came et al 2007); Lena Delta (Meyer et al 2015); solar insolation in January and July at 60°N (Laskar et al 2004) …”

Ice Complex permafrost of MIS5 age in the Dmitry Laptev Strait coastal region (East Siberian Arctic)

“…Ice-wedge stable water isotopes are commonly used as a proxy for winter air temperature (e.g. Meyer et al, 2010Meyer et al, , 2015 18 O-dD bi-plot is 6.9 The Buchchagy IC profile on the Oyogos Yar mainland coast (Oy7-10) is demarcated by two syngenetic ice wedges several metres wide (Fig. 3).…”