Evidence for Control of the Pleistocene ice age Climate by Earth's Orbital Eccentricity

Astronomy and Astrophysics – Astronomy

Scientific paper

Rate now

  [ 0.00 ] – not rated yet Voters 0   Comments 0

Details

3300 Meteorology And Atmospheric Dynamics, 3344 Paleoclimatology

Scientific paper

Whether or not the great ice ages of the Pleistocene were driven by cyclic variations in earth's orbital eccentricity is still vigorously debated because no clear eccentricity signal has yet been demonstrably detected in the paleoclimate data. It is shown here that by frequency demodulating orbitally untuned paleoclimate deep-sea d18O records it is possible to extract the eccentricity-driven insolation signal directly from the data, thereby showing that the Pleistocene ice ages of the last 2 million years were at least in part driven by changes in Earth's orbital eccentricity. The 413ky eccentricity signal and its harmonics are found to have a very strong presence everywhere throughout the data. The finding supports the classic Milankovitch-Croll astronomical theory, but only insofar as the presence of the eccentricity signal, since the response of the climate system to the astronomical forcing is found to be highly nonlinear, probably one reason why paleoclimate records are so notoriously difficult to explain by astronomical forcing alone. Ironically, the development over a decade ago of a timescale based on tuning to an astronomical target curve has been a major contributor in covering up the presence of astronomical forcing in the data.

No associations

LandOfFree

Say what you really think

Search LandOfFree.com for scientists and scientific papers. Rate them and share your experience with other people.

Rating

Evidence for Control of the Pleistocene ice age Climate by Earth's Orbital Eccentricity does not yet have a rating. At this time, there are no reviews or comments for this scientific paper.

If you have personal experience with Evidence for Control of the Pleistocene ice age Climate by Earth's Orbital Eccentricity, we encourage you to share that experience with our LandOfFree.com community. Your opinion is very important and Evidence for Control of the Pleistocene ice age Climate by Earth's Orbital Eccentricity will most certainly appreciate the feedback.

Rate now

     

Profile ID: LFWR-SCP-O-1272632

  Search
All data on this website is collected from public sources. Our data reflects the most accurate information available at the time of publication.