A record of Holocene climate change from lake geochemical analyses in southeastern Arabia

Lacustrine sediments from southeastern Arabia reveal variations in lake level corresponding to changes in the strength and duration of Indian Ocean Monsoon (IOM) summer rainfall and winter cyclonic rainfall. The late glacial/Holocene transition of the region was characterised by the development of mega-linear dunes. These dunes became stabilised and vegetated during the early Holocene and interdunal lakes formed in response to the incursion of the IOM at approximately 8500 cal yr BP with the development of C3 dominated savanna grasslands. The IOM weakened ca. 6000 cal yr BP with the onset of regional aridity, aeolian sedimentation and dune reactivation and accretion. Despite this reduction in precipitation, the lake was maintained by winter dominated rainfall. There was a shift to drier adapted C4 grasslands across the dune field. Lake sediment geochemical analyses record precipitation minima at 8200, 5000 and 4200 cal yr BP that coincide with Bond events in the North Atlantic. A number of these events correspond with changes in cultural periods, suggesting that climate was a key mechanism affecting human occupation and exploitation of this region.     

Style Transfer applied to CT image downscaling: a study case from Brazilian Coquinas

Computational Geosciences - The identification of micropore systems in carbonate rocks is an important task of image processing because of the high impact these systems cause on fluid flow....     

Climate change drives coherent trends in physics and oxygen content in North American lakes

Using a 25-year record of monitoring data, we show that recent climate change has affected the thermal properties and oxygen content of seven lakes in south-central Ontario, Canada, and five lakes in north-central Wisconsin, USA. Coherent patterns in autumnal lake warming were driven by increased autumn air temperature in both lake districts. Temperature increases were restricted to the epilimnion and metalimnion of the lakes, resulting in increased thermal stability of the water column. Mixing depths also decreased over the study period. Shallower mixing depths in the Ontario lakes were due to climate-driven increases in lake-water dissolved organic carbon concentrations. Collectively, changes in the thermal regime of the lakes suggest autumn mixing of the water column may be delayed. Metalimnetic oxygen also increased in the Wisconsin lakes, perhaps in response to increased algal production as lake thermal regimes changed. The response of individual lakes to climate change was modified by lake chemistry in the Ontario lake district and by lake chemistry and morphometry in the Wisconsin lake district. Our results demonstrate coherent lake response to climate change and highlight the importance of both regional and local factors in regulating individual lake response to global climate change.     

Interannual variability associated with ENSO: present and future climate projections of RegCM4 for South America-CORDEX domain

Interannual variability over South America (SA) is mainly controlled by the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) phenomenon. This study investigates the ENSO precipitation signal during austral spring (September–October–November-SON) over SA. Three global circulation models-GCMs-(MPI, GFDL and HadGEM2) are used for RegCM4 (Regional Climate Model version 4) downscaling of the present (1975–2005) near-future (2020–2050) and far-future (2070–2098) climates using two greenhouse gas stabilization scenarios (RCP4.5 and RCP8.5). For the present climate, only HadGEM2 simulates a frequency of El Niño (EN) and La Niña (LN) years similar to the observations. In terms of ENSO frequency changes, only in the far-future RCP8.5 climate there is greater agreement among GCMs, indicating an increase (decrease) of EN (LN) years. In the present climate, validation indicates that only the RegCM4 ensemble mean provides acceptable precipitation biases (smaller than ±20 %) in the two investigated regions. In this period, the GCMs and RegCM4 agree on the relationship between ENSO and precipitation in SA, i.e., both are able to capture the observed regions of positive/negative rainfall anomalies during EN years, with RegCM4 improving on the GCMs’ signal over southeastern SA. For the near and far future climates, in general, the projections indicate an increase (decrease) of precipitation over southeastern SA (northern-northeastern SA). However, the relationship between ENSO and rainfall in most of RegCM4 and GCM members is weaker in the near and far future climates than in the present day climate. This is likely connected with the GCMs’ projection of the more intense ENSO signal displaced to the central basin of Pacific Ocean in the far future compared to present climate.     

Did fires drive Holocene carbon sequestration in boreal ombrotrophic peatlands of eastern Canada?

Wildfire is an important factor on carbon sequestration in the North American boreal biomes. Being globally important stocks of organic carbon, peatlands may be less sensitive to burning in comparison with upland forests, especially wet unforested ombrotrophic ecosystems as found in northeastern Canada. We aimed to determine if peatland fires have driven carbon accumulation patterns during the Holocene. To cover spatial variability, six cores from three peatlands in the Eastmain region of Quebec were analyzed for stratigraphic charcoal accumulation. Results show that regional Holocene peatland fire frequency was ~ 2.4 fires 1000 yr^? 1, showing a gradually declining trend since 4000 cal yr BP, although inter- and intra-peatland variability was very high. Charcoal peak magnitudes, however, were significantly higher between 1400 and 400 cal yr BP, possibly reflecting higher charcoal production driven by differential climatic forcing aspects. Carbon accumulation rates generally declined towards the late-Holocene with minimum values of ~ 10 g m^? 2 yr^? 1 around 1500 cal yr BP. The absence of a clear correlation between peatland fire regimes and carbon accumulation indicates that fire regimes have not been a driving factor on carbon sequestration at the millennial time scale.     

Regional soil erosion in response to land use and increased typhoon frequency and intensity,Taiwan

Reservoir sedimentation data and sediment yields from Taiwanese rivers show increased soil erosion in response to both 20th century changes in land use and a more recent increase in typhoon frequency and intensity. Decadal variations of up to 5- to 20-fold in suspended-sediment rating curves demonstrate supply-limited transport and correspond to increased sediment delivery from hillslopes due to changes in land use, regional ground shaking during the Chi-Chi earthquake, and post-2000 changes in typhoon frequency and intensity. While accelerated erosion in central Taiwan after the Chi-Chi earthquake has been documented previously, our results show that periods of increased upland erosion also occurred earlier, in response to 20th century changes in land use. Analyses of rainfall records and typhoon frequency for the period 1900–2009 further point to an island-wide increase in erosion rates corresponding to increased typhoon frequency and intensity after 1990.     

Impacts of a raw sewage spill on water and sediment quality in an urbanized estuary

A sewer main serving a large municipal wastewater system ruptured, discharging approximately 3,000,000 gallons (11,355,000 L) of raw human sewage into a multi-branched tidal creek estuary along the US East Coast. The biochemical oxygen demand caused severe hypoxia in the system, causing a large fish kill. The sewage load led to high fecal coliform bacteria concentrations in the creek (maximum of 270,000 CFU 100ml(-1)), which declined in an approximate logarithmic manner over the first few days. The spill caused elevated sediment fecal coliform bacteria and enterococcus counts that declined much more gradually than water column counts. Persistence of relatively high concentrations of fecal indicator bacteria in sediments for several weeks after the spill suggests that sediment sampling should be included in response to major sewage spills. The high concentration of nutrients in the spilled sewage led to several algal blooms. However, nutrient concentrations in the water column declined rapidly, demonstrating the value of conserving marshes because of their pollutant filtration function.     

Climate, agriculture, and cycles of human occupation over the last 4000 yr in southern Zacatecas, Mexico

Scholars attribute the growth and decline of Classic period (AD 200-900) settlements in the semi-arid northern frontier zone of Mesoamerica to rainfall cycles that controlled the extent of arable land. However, there is little empirical evidence to support this claim. We present phytolith, organic carbon, and magnetic susceptibility analyses of a 4000-yr alluvial record of climate and human land use from the Malpaso Valley, the site of one such Classic frontier community. The earliest farming occupation is detected around 500 BC and appears related to a slight increase of aridity, similar to the level of the modern day valley. By AD 500, the valley's Classic period Mesoamerican settlements were founded under these same dry conditions, which continued into the Postclassic period. This indicates that the La Quemada occupation did not develop during a period of increased rainfall, but rather an arid phase. The most dramatic changes detected in the valley resulted from the erosion associated with Spanish Colonial grazing and deforestation that began in the 16th century. The landscape of the modern Malpaso Valley is thus primarily the product of a series of intense and rapid transformations that were concentrated within the last 400 yr.