Ice Complex formation in arctic East Siberia during the MIS3 Interstadial

Abstract

A continuous 15 m long sequence of Ice Complex permafrost (Yedoma) exposed in a thermo-cirque at the southern coast of Bol'shoy Lyakhovsky Island (New Siberian Archipelago, Dmitry Laptev Strait) was studied to reconstruct past landscape and environmental dynamics. The sequence accumulated during the Marine Isotope Stage 3 (MIS3) Interstadial between >49 and 29 ka BP in an ice-wedge polygon. The frozen deposits were cryolithologically described and sampled on a vertical bluff between two ice wedges. According to sedimentological and geochronological data, the section is subdivided into three units which correlate with environmental conditions of the early, middle, and late MIS3 period. Palynological data support this stratification. The stable isotope signature of texture ice in the polygon structure reflects fractionation due to local freeze–thaw processes, while the signature of an approximately 5 m wide and more than 17 m high ice wedge fits very well into the regional stable-water isotope record. Regional climate dynamics during the MIS3 Interstadial and local landscape conditions of the polygonal patterned ground controlled the Ice Complex formation. The sequence presented here completes previously published MIS3 permafrost records in Northeast Siberia. Late Quaternary stadial-interstadial climate variability in arctic West Beringia is preserved at millennial resolution in the Ice Complex. A MIS3 climate optimum was revealed between 48 and 38 ka BP from the Ice Complex on Bol'shoy Lyakhovsky Island.