Vostok ice core: climatic response to CO2 and orbital forcing changes over the last climatic cycle

Genthon, G.; Barnola, J. M.; Raynaud, Dominique; Lorius, C.; Jouzel, Jean; Barkov, N. I.; Korotkevich, Y. S.; Kotlyakov, V. M.

doi:10.1038/329414a0

Cited by 215 publications

(102 citation statements)

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“…The Swiss team at Byrd and the French team at Dome C then contributed to a major discovery and confirmed the prediction of S. Arrhenius at the end of the 19th century: at the LGM, CO 2 concentration was indeed 30 % less than that of the preindustrial period before human activity began to change it. Thanks to the Vostok ice core, French researchers had access a few years later to ice covering a full glacial-interglacial cycle: throughout the last 150 000 yr, CO 2 concentration in entrapped air appears closely correlated with the temperature derived from the isotopic composition of the ice Jouzel et al, 1987b;Genthon et al, 1987;Raynaud et al, 1993). Colder periods are associated with lower CO 2 and vice-versa, a property which holds true all along the 4 climatic cycles covered by the Vostok ice core .…”

Section: Greenhouse Gases and Other Properties Recorded In The Entrapmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Many other gaseous species such as CO (Haan et al, 1996;Haan and Raynaud, 1998;Haan et al, 1996;Haan and Raynaud, 1998), COS (Sturges et al, 2001a), various chlorine, bromine and iodide, and other species of interest for atmospheric chemistry (Sturges et al, 2001b;Reeves et al, 2005) have also been measured in firn and ice. The Vostok data published in the eighties and nineties led to the idea that the variations in greenhouse gases have played an important climatic role in the past as amplifiers vis-à-vis changes in insolation (Genthon et al, 1987;Lorius et al, 1990;Jouzel et al, 1993;Petit et al, 1999). Further confirmed by the extension of the CO 2 and CH 4 records to the last 800 000 yr, this interpretation -which was already taken as a clear illustration of the climatic role of CO 2 at the time of the launching of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (1988) -is fully supported by climate models.…”

Section: Greenhouse Gases and Other Properties Recorded In The Entrapmentioning

confidence: 99%

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A brief history of ice core science over the last 50 yr

Jouzel

2013

Clim. Past

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104

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Abstract. For about 50 yr, ice cores have provided a wealth of information about past climatic and environmental changes. Ice cores from Greenland, Antarctica and other glacier-covered regions now encompass a variety of time scales. However, the longer time scales (e.g. at least back to the Last Glacial period) are covered by deep ice cores, the number of which is still very limited: seven from Greenland, with only one providing an undisturbed record of a part of the last interglacial period, and a dozen from Antarctica, with the longest record covering the last 800 000 yr. This article aims to summarize this successful adventure initiated by a few pioneers and their teams and to review key scientific results by focusing on climate (in particular water isotopes) and climate-related (e.g. greenhouse gases) reconstructions. Future research is well taken into account by the four projects defined by IPICS. However, it remains a challenge to get an intact record of the Last Interglacial in Greenland and to extend the Antarctic record through the mid-Pleistocene transition, if possible back to 1.5 Ma.

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Section: Greenhouse Gases and Other Properties Recorded In The Entrapmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Greenhouse Gases and Other Properties Recorded In The Entrapmentioning

confidence: 99%

A brief history of ice core science over the last 50 yr

Jouzel

2013

Clim. Past

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104

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“…The well-known "greenhouse effect" suggests that worldwide temperatures are strongly affected by the amount of CO 2 gas in the atmosphere. The recent discovery that the atmospheric CO 2 content varied through the Late Pleistocene suggests that much of the earth's climatic variability may reflect changing atmospheric CO 2 content (Genthon et al, 1987).…”

Section: Causes Of Middle Wisconsinan Climate Variabilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Middle Wisconsinan Climate Fluctuations Recorded in Central Alaskan Loess

Begét¹

2007

gpq

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Fluctuations in Middle Wisconsinan environments are recorded in high resolution proxy climatic curves derived from magnetic susceptibility profiling of central Alaskan loess. Two intervals of low wind intensity and climatic amelioration, separated by a period of somewhat higher wind intensity, can be recognized in several loess records of the Middle Wisconsinan. Radiocarbon dates from loess in the Fox Permafrost Tunnel indicate that the culmination of the later period of low wind intensity occurred ca. 30-32.000 yr BP, and was associated with thermal degradation of permafrost. An older period of low wind intensity early in the Middle Wisconsinan, ca. 50-60,000 yr BP, is correlative with a fossil wood horizon in the permafrost tunnel and a widespread paleosol in loess sections. Warm intervals of similar age are recorded in the Grande Pile pollen record, in ice cores and in marines cores. The 30-32,000 yr BP and the 50-60,000 yr BP warm events recorded in Alaskan loess sequences may have been caused by "greenhouse" warming produced by transient increases in atmospheric CO2 as recorded in the Vostok ice core. A Middle Wisconsinan interval of higher wind intensity, associated with the development of ice wedges, may reflect climatic cooling due to low atmospheric CO2 values ca. 42,000 yr BP.Les courbes climatiques très précises tracées à partir des profils de susceptibilité magnétique faites sur le loess du centre de l'Alaska ont montré des fluctuations au Wisconsinien moyen. Deux intervalles de vents de faible intensité et de réchauffement climatique, séparés par une période de vents plus forts, ont pu être reconstitués à partir de plusieurs inventaires loessiques du Wisconsinien moyen. Les dates au radiocarbone recueillies sur le loess du Fox Permafrost Tunnel montre que l'optimum de la dernière période de vents faibles a eu lieu vers 30-32 ka BP, et qu'il était associé à une régression du pergélisol. Une période plus ancienne de vents faibles au début du Wisconsinien moyen (vers 50-60 ka BP) correspond à un horizon de bois fossile du Permafrost Tunnel et à un paléosol d'une grande superficie dans les régions de loess. Des intervalles datant de la même époque ont été observés à partir des données polliniques de Grande Pile, provenant de carottes marines et de glace. Les périodes chaudes de 30-32 ka et de 50-60 ka BP relevées dans les séquences de loess de l'Alaska ont peut-être été provoquées par l'effet de serre en raison de l'augmentation du CO2 atmosphérique comme l'a enregistrée la carotte de glace de Vostok. L'intervalle de vents plus intenses associé au développement de coins de glace reflète peut-être un refroidissement climatique lié aux faibles valeurs de CO2 atmosphérique, vers 42 ka BP.Die Fluktuationen in der Umwelt des mittleren Wiskonsiniums sind in sehr pràzisen KIimakurven abgebildet, die mittels Magnet-Empfindlichkeitsprofilen auf dem Loss von Zentral-Alaska aufgezeichnet wurden. Zwei Intervalle niedriger Windintensitât und klimatischer Verbesserung, die durch eine Période relativ hôherer Windintens...

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“…Indeed, the CO 2 record mimics the temperature record over the four climatic cycles, and the record in Petit et al (1999) extended the one published 12 years before by three more climatic cycles. In the late 1980s, a set of three papers dedicated to Vostok ice core published by Nature magazine Barnola et al, 1987;Genthon et al, 1987) made a large impact and generated much interest, with someone calling it a "big bang" for the scientific community. The link between the climate and the carbon cycle was clearly established, and polar ice became the indisputable complementary archive to marine sediments.…”

Section: The 400000-year Climate Recordmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Vostok Venture: An Outcome of the Antarctic Treaty

Petit¹

2011

Science Diplomacy : Science, Antarctica, and the Governance of International Spaces

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INTRODUCTIONPolar ice sheets and glaciers contain well-ordered archives of ancient ice that fell as snow, years to millions of years ago. With an ice blanket of more than 3 km thick and an annual precipitation rate comparable to that from hyperarid regions (equivalent to 2-5 cm water annually), the slow-moving East Antarctic plateau has considerable potential for providing a long-undisturbed ice sequence. Because of the remoteness of inland sites along with the harsh weather conditions, exploration and deployment of scientific traverses or deep ice core drilling operations require coordination of considerable logistic support, technical, and scientific skills.Vostok station was settled at the time of the International Geophysical Year (IGY) by the Soviet Union and is a location 1,400 km from the coast at 3,488 m above sea level altitude, with an annual temperature of -55°C. Thanks to the Antarctic Treaty, which promoted the international collaboration, the study of a 2-km-deep ice core revealed the close link between temperature and atmospheric CO 2 over the last 150,000 years. This fact soon revealed the climate issues caused by increasing anthropogenic emissions of greenhouse gases.The ice composition and impurities and the gases trapped in air bubbles provide a unique history of the past climate change and environmental and atmospheric composition. By reaching 3.4 km depth, the climate record was extended back 400,000 years, confirming the close climate-greenhouse gas relationship. This link is now further extended over 800,000 years.At the base of the ice sheets the geothermal flux warms the ice, up to the melting point in some places. The water produced accumulates at the interface with the bedrock to form a lake. This is the case in the region of Vostok, where a giant lake lies under the station. Ice core drilling penetrated an ice massif of refrozen lake water at 3.6 km depth. The recovery of frozen lake samples opens new fields for research, especially for the search for life in this very extreme environment, which may help the search for life elsewhere.

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Vostok ice core: climatic response to CO2 and orbital forcing changes over the last climatic cycle

Cited by 215 publications

References 46 publications

A brief history of ice core science over the last 50 yr

A brief history of ice core science over the last 50 yr

Middle Wisconsinan Climate Fluctuations Recorded in Central Alaskan Loess

The Vostok Venture: An Outcome of the Antarctic Treaty

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