Hong Ao, Diederik Liebrand, Mark J Dekkers, Andrew P Roberts, Tara N Jonell, Zhangdong Jin, Yougui Song, Qingsong Liu, Qiang Sun, Xinxia Li, Chunju Huang, Xiaoke Qiang, Peng Zhang
Intensification of northern hemisphere glaciation (iNHG), ~2.7 million years ago (Ma), led to establishment of the Pleistocene to present-day bipolar icehouse state. Here we document evolution of orbital- and millennial-scale Asian winter monsoon (AWM) variability across the iNHG using a palaeomagnetically dated centennial-resolution grain size record between 3.6 and 1.9 Ma from a previously undescribed loess-palaeosol/red clay section on the central Chinese Loess Plateau. We find that the late Pliocene-early Pleistocene AWM was characterized by combined 41-kyr and ~100-kyr cycles, in response to ice volume and atmospheric CO2 forcing...
April 19, 2024: Nature Communications