Description: Changes in heat transport associated with fluctuations in the strength of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation (AMOC) are widely considered to affect the position of the Intertropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ), but the temporal immediacy of this teleconnection has to date not been resolved. Based on a high‐resolution marine sediment sequence over the last deglaciation, we provide evidence for a synchronous and near‐linear link between changes in the Atlantic interhemispheric sea surface temperature difference and continental precipitation over northeast Brazil. The tight coupling between AMOC strength, sea surface temperature difference, and precipitation changes over northeast Brazil unambiguously points to a rapid and proportional adjustment of the ITCZ location to past changes in the Atlantic meridional heat transport.

Description: Periods of enhanced terrigenous input to the ocean's basins of the North Atlantic have been reported for the last glacial period. We present a set of new sediment cores recovered from the Sophia Basin north of Svalbard which exhibit widespread ice-rafted debris layers reflecting enhanced terrigenous input throughout the last ∼200 ka B.P. Their consistent stratigraphic position, sedimentological character, high sedimentation rate, and geochemical characteristic point to synchronously deposited layers which we name terrigenous input events (TIEs). Owing to their higher densities, they generate excellent reflectors for sediment-penetrating acoustic devices and prominent acoustic layers in the imagery of sedimentary structures. Therefore TIEs can be used for regional acoustic stratigraphy. Each of the events can be linked to major glacial activity on Svalbard. However, the Early Weichselian glaciation is not recorded as a TIE and, in agreement with other work, might not have occurred on Svalbard as a major glacial advance to the shelf break. Nonsynchronous timing of western and northern sources on Svalbard points against sea level–induced iceberg discharge events.

Description: To test the pore density in benthic foraminifera as a potential proxy for bottom-water oxygenation, pore density analyses were carried out on tests of living (rose Bengal-stained) specimens of the deep-infaunal and anoxia-tolerant foraminiferal species Globobulimina turgida. Three stations within and two stations below the oxygen minimum zone (OMZ) off Namibia were investigated and compared to in situ-measured bottom-water oxygen content (BW-O2). Pore density was first conventionally assessed by rather time-consuming manual pore counting on SEM photographs and measurement of the analyzed test areas. To significantly shorten the measurement time we tested and evaluated an automation of the pore density measurement using the image analysis software package analySIS (version 5.0, Olympus Soft Imaging Solutions). Pore density data from automated analyses are compared to manually acquired data from G. turgida. Our study shows almost identical results for both manually and automatically acquired data. Consequently, we assume that the new technique provides an alternative and more rapid method to analyze the pore density of foraminifera. For both methods, our results show a distinct negative linear correlation (automatically analyzed pore density: τ = −0.50, p 〈 0.001; manually analyzed pore density: τ = −0.49, p 〈 0.001) between pore density and BW-O2, suggesting that G. turgida increases its pore density in response to decreasing oxygen. Thus, we suggest that, similar to other recently described low-oxygen-tolerant benthic foraminiferal species, G. turgida may improve its O2 uptake by increasing pore density to survive in low-oxic environments. This morphological adaption might be useful for future studies to establish an independent proxy for BW-O2. In addition, pore density has been compared to in situ-measured bottom-water nitrate concentration (BW-NO3−). Our investigation of the pore density-to-BW-NO3− relationship for G. turgida suggests that nitrate seems to be a minor factor influencing pore density in this species compared to BW-O2. Add to CiteULike