High-resolution record of the last climatic cycle in the southern Carpathian Basin (Surduk, Vojvodina, Serbia)

Abstract

High-resolution study of the Surduk loess palaeosols sequence in Serbia (Vojvodina) has been performed within a research project (EOLE) focusing on the impact of rapid climatic changes during the last climatic cycle in the European loess belt. The methodology used for this multidisciplinary approach is based on a continuous sampling column that allows a very accurate correlation between all studied proxies (magnetic susceptibility, grain size and organic carbon) and the dated samples (IRSL, 14C). According to the stratigraphical and sedimentological data, the Surduk loess sequence appears as a very complete record of the last climatic cycle (19 m), and exhibits a similar pattern than other contemporaneous loess sequences from Western, Central and Eastern Europe. The main difference is the evidence of a drier environment all over the last climatic cycle (sedimentological and palaeopedological data). The high-resolution grain size record (5 cm) is well correlated with stratigraphical boundaries, and highlights a strong variability within the loess deposition, especially during the Upper Pleniglacial between ca. 33 and 15 ka. During the Upper Pleniglacial, a succession of millennial-timescale events, characterised by the deposition of coarser loess, are particularly well evidenced by grain size data as in some west-European records. Finally, an attempt to correlate the variations of grain size parameters at Surduk with the Greenland GRIP dust record is proposed. According to this study, millennial-timescale climatic events that characterise the North Atlantic area during the last climatic cycle have thus been recorded in the environments located at the southern border of the European loess belt.