Presented by Dr Laura Robinson (University of Bristol)
The transition from the last glacial to the Holocene was a major climate reorganisation, characterised by a series of abrupt changes in parameters such as temperature and carbon dioxide. Data and models indicate a significant role for the ocean, and the Atlantic overturning circulation in particular, in propagating the effects of this change. Ice core and speleothem records have given us high resolution insights into high and low latitude terrestrial and atmospheric changes, whilst oceanic records predominantly come from sediment cores.
In this presentation I will show recent efforts to use the skeletal remains of deep-sea corals collected from the Southern Ocean and Equatorial Atlantic to reconstruct the geochemistry of the ocean during the deglaciation. Together these data give a coherent picture of the ventilation changes at intermediate depths on an independent chronology comparable to ice core records.