Millennial-scale precipitation changes in southern Brazil over the past 90,000 years

Abstract

A U-Th dated 90,000 year-long speleothem oxygen isotope record from southern Brazil anti-correlates remarkably with the cave calcite records from eastern China, but positively correlates with the speleothem record from northeastern Brazil, suggesting an interhemispheric anti-phasing of rainfall on both millennial and orbital timescales, likely related to displacement in the mean position of the intertropical convergence zone and associated asymmetry in Hadley circulation. The phase relationships among these records are consistent with the hypothesis that abrupt climate events during the last glacial period are triggered by oceanic circulation changes in the high latitudes and enhanced by tropical feedbacks. Copyright 2007 by the American Geophysical Union.