Organic biomarker records spanning the last 34,800 years from the southeastern Brazilian upper slope: links between sea surface temperature, displacement of the Brazil Current, and marine productivity

Abstract

Collective assessment of marine and terrigenous organic biomarkers was performed on a sediment core spanning the last 34,800 years on the upper slope southeast of Brazil to verify the signatures of climatic variations in sea surface temperature (SST), marine productivity, and the flux of terrigenous material in this region. This evaluation is based on marine and terrigenous proxies including alkenones, chlorins, aliphatic hydrocarbons, n-alcohols, and fatty acids. This first report of organic biomarker data for this region confirms a correlation between SST, changes in terrigenous organic matter flow into the ocean, and marine productivity over the last 34.8 ka as a response to the displacement of the Brazil Current. Conditions prevailing during marine isotopic stage (MIS) 3 may be considered intermediate between the last glacial maximum (LGM) and the Late Holocene. For MIS 2, a period of low relative sea level, it was verified that the lowest SSTs were associated with the LGM and higher marine productivity. SST increased by up to 4.4 °C between the LGM and the Holocene. This reveals synchronicity between SST on the southeastern Brazilian upper slope and the North Atlantic Ocean SST records reported in earlier studies.