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Water stable isotope record of ice core WAIS divide

Changes in atmospheric circulation over the past five decades have enhanced the wind-driven inflow of warm ocean water onto the Antarctic continental shelf, where it melts ice shelves from below. Atmospheric circulation changes have also caused rapid warming over the West Antarctic Ice Sheet, and contributed to declining sea-ice cover in the adjacent Amundsen-Bellingshausen seas. It is unknown whether these changes are part of a longer-term trend. Here, we use water-isotope (d18O) data from an array of ice-core records to place recent West Antarctic climate changes in the context of the past two millennia. We find that the d18O of West Antarctic precipitation has increased significantly in the past 50 years, in parallel with the trend in temperature, and was probably more elevated during the 1990s than at any other time during the past 200 years. However, d18O anomalies comparable to those of recent decades occur about 1% of the time over the past 2,000 years. General circulation model simulations suggest that recent trends in d18O and climate in West Antarctica cannot be distinguished from decadal variability that originates in the tropics. We conclude that the uncertain trajectory of tropical climate variability represents a significant source of uncertainty in projections of West Antarctic climate and ice-sheet change.

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Cite this as

Steig, Eric J, Ding, Quinghua, White, James W C, Küttel, Meinrad, Rupper, Summer B, Neumann, T A, Neff, Peter D, Gallant, Ailie J E, Mayewski, Paul Andrew, Taylor, Kendrick C, Hoffmann, Georg, Dixon, Daniel A, Schoenemann, Spruce W, Markle, Bradley R, Fudge, Tyler J, Schneider, David P, Schauer, Andrew J, Teel, Rebecca P, Vaughn, Bruce H, Burgener, Landon, Williams, Jessica, Korotkikh, Elena, Gkinis, Vasileios (2018). Dataset: Water stable isotope record of ice core WAIS divide. https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.886046

DOI retrieved: 2018

Additional Info

Field Value
Imported on November 29, 2024
Last update November 29, 2024
License CC-BY-NC-ND-3.0
Source https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.886046
Author Steig, Eric J
Given Name Eric J
Family Name Steig
More Authors
Ding, Quinghua
White, James W C
Küttel, Meinrad
Rupper, Summer B
Neumann, T A
Neff, Peter D
Gallant, Ailie J E
Mayewski, Paul Andrew
Taylor, Kendrick C
Hoffmann, Georg
Dixon, Daniel A
Schoenemann, Spruce W
Markle, Bradley R
Fudge, Tyler J
Schneider, David P
Schauer, Andrew J
Teel, Rebecca P
Vaughn, Bruce H
Burgener, Landon
Williams, Jessica
Korotkikh, Elena
Gkinis, Vasileios
Source Creation 2018
Publication Year 2018
Resource Type text/tab-separated-values - filename: WAIS_isot
Subject Areas
Name: Cryosphere

Name: Lithosphere

Related Identifiers
Title: Recent climate and ice-sheet changes in West Antarctica compared with the past 2,000 years
Identifier: https://doi.org/10.1038/NGEO1778
Type: DOI
Relation: IsSupplementTo
Year: 2013
Source: Nature Geoscience
Authors: Steig Eric J , Ding Quinghua , White James W C , Küttel Meinrad , Rupper Summer B , Neumann T A , Neff Peter D , Gallant Ailie J E , Mayewski Paul Andrew , Taylor Kendrick C , Hoffmann Georg , Dixon Daniel A , Schoenemann Spruce W , Markle Bradley R , Fudge Tyler J , Schneider David P , Schauer Andrew J , Teel Rebecca P , Vaughn Bruce H , Burgener Landon , Williams Jessica , Korotkikh Elena .