Millennial-scale changes in the environment, ice conditions, and deep-water ventilation at the Detroit–Tenji Seamounts, Northwest Pacific, over the last 43 kyr

Abstract

The Western Subarctic Gyre (WSG) in the North Pacific represents the termination of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC). It has been strongly influenced by periodic glaciations of adjacent landmasses, orbital- and millennial-scale variability of its environment, and ventilation, which, to date, have been poorly studied. In this study, we investigated sediment core LV76-21 recovered from the Detroit Seamount using several productivity and lithological proxies, δ18O records of planktic and benthic foraminifera (δ18Opf and δ18Obf), AMS 14C data. We also used the published results from three well-dated cores from the Detroit and Tenji Seamounts. Comparison of the δ18Opf and δ18Obf records allowed us to establish iceberg discharge events 1 and 1’ at 39–36.8 and 42–40 ka, respectively, in the WSG over the last 43 kyr. This was accompanied by considerable lightning of δ18Opf relative to the coeval δ18Obf values. The lithological results have also shown variable sea-ice influence on the regional environment during Marine Isotope Stage 3 and particularly 2, with sea ice extensions at 28.5–25.5 ka and 17.6–16.6 ka, and its significant loss since the Bølling–Allerød warming. We used high resolution δ18Obf records from studied cores as a subtle proxy of contribution of North Atlantic Deep Water (NADW) to Lower Circumpolar Deep Water (LCDW), which originating from around Antarctica and have slightly different δ18Obf values, in order to reconstruction of its spatial variability in the context of regional deep-water ventilation. The contribution of NADW to LCDW in the ventilation of the western flank of Detroit Seamount significantly increased during the interglacial and long-lasting Dansgaard–Oeschger interstadials, which was synchronous with the AMOC intensification. Over the last 43 kyr, the deep water of its eastern flank has been constantly ventilated by the LCDW with low contribution of NADW.