Description: Highlights • We reconstructed variation in nutrient utilization over the Laptev Sea throughout the Holocene. • The Holocene Siberian transgression modulated the water column structure and created unstable conditions until 4 ka. • Oceanographic conditions favourable to the onset of the Laptev Sea ‘sea-ice factory’ were reached around 2 ka. Abstract Understanding the dynamic of freshwater and sea-ice export from the Arctic is crucial to better comprehend the potential near-future climate change consequences. Here, we report nitrogen isotope data of a core from the Laptev Sea to shed light on the impact of the Holocene Siberian transgression on the summer stratification of the Laptev Sea. Our data suggest that the oceanographic setting was less favourable to sea-ice formation in the Laptev Sea during the early to mid-Holocene. It is only after the sea level reached a standstill at around 4 ka that the water column structure in the Laptev Sea became more stable. Modern-day conditions, often described as “sea-ice factory”, were reached about 2 ka ago, after the development of a strong summer stratification. These results are consistent with sea-ice reconstruction along the Transpolar Drift, highlighting the potential contribution of the Laptev Sea to the export of freshwater from the Arctic Ocean.

Description: Water mass exchange between the Arctic Ocean and the Norwegian-Greenland Seas has played an important role for the Atlantic thermohaline circulation and Northern Hemisphere climate. We reconstruct past water mass mixing and erosional inputs from the radiogenic isotope compositions of neodymium (Nd), lead (Pb), and strontium (Sr) at Ocean Drilling Program site 911 (leg 151) from 906 m water depth on Yermak Plateau in the Fram Strait over the past 5.2 Myr. The isotopic compositions of past bottom waters were extracted from authigenic oxyhydroxide coatings of the bulk sediments. Neodymium isotope signatures obtained from surface sediments agree well with present-day deepwater εNd signature of −11.0 ± 0.2. Prior to 2.7 Ma the Nd and Pb isotope compositions of the bottom waters only show small variations indicative of a consistent influence of Atlantic waters. Since the major intensification of the Northern Hemisphere Glaciation at 2.7 Ma the seawater Nd isotope composition has varied more pronouncedly due to changes in weathering inputs related to the waxing and waning of the ice sheets on Svalbard, the Barents Sea, and the Eurasian shelf, due to changes in water mass exchange and due to the increasing supply of ice-rafted debris (IRD) originating from the Arctic Ocean. The seawater Pb isotope record also exhibits a higher short-term variability after 2.7 Ma, but there is also a trend toward more radiogenic values, which reflects a combination of changes in input sources and enhanced incongruent weathering inputs of Pb released from freshly eroded old continental rocks.

Description: The development of various combinative methods for Arctic sea ice reconstruction using the sympagic highly-branched isoprenoid IP25 in conjunction with pelagic biomarkers has often facilitated more detailed descriptions of sea ice conditions than using IP25 alone. Here, we investigated the complementary application of the Phytoplankton-IP25 index (PIP25) and a recently proposed Classification Tree (CT) model for describing shifts in sea ice conditions to assess the consistency of both methods. Based on biomarker data from three downcore records from the Barents Sea spanning millennial timescales, we showcase apparent and potential limitations of both approaches, and provide recommendations for their identification or prevention. Both methods provided generally consistent outcomes and, within the studied cores, captured abrupt shifts in sea ice regimes, such as those evident during the Younger Dryas, as well as more gradual trends in sea ice conditions during the Holocene. The most significant discrepancies occurred during periods of highly unstable climate change, such as those characteristic of the Younger Dryas-Holocene transition. Such intervals of increased discrepancy were identifiable by significant changes of HBI distributions and correlations to values not observed in proximal surface sediments. We suggest that periods of highly-fluctuating climate that are not represented in modern settings may hinder the performance and complementary application of PIP25 and CT-based methods, and that data visualisation techniques should be employed to identify such occurrences in downcore records. Additionally, due to the reliance of both methods on biomarker distributions, we emphasise the importance of accurate and consistent biomarker quantification for future investigations.