Southeast Asian dust flux reconstructed using accurately dated stalagmite thorium concentrations

Abstract

Mineral dust flux is an important component of the global climate system, but chronological uncertainties complicate interpretations of the timing and magnitude of paleo-dust fluxes. This study establishes a correlation between modern satellite-derived atmospheric dust concentration data and stalagmite thorium concentrations (from published records of stalagmites growing over the last 500 years), and subsequently applies this relationship to reconstruct Asian dust flux during the late Pleistocene using published records. Thorium is an element often associated with mineral dust, and because most stalagmite records are dated using uranium-thorium disequilibrium techniques, a spatiotemporally large, yet untapped, database of thorium concentrations exists. Specifically, 194 thorium records from South-East (SE) Asian stalagmites were compiled to produce a composite SE Asian dust flux record for the past 100,000 years. The new dust flux record is consistent with the perspective that dust flux is a function of westerly wind strength across Asia and regional aridity. Dansgaard-Oeschger (D-O) event expression within the median stalagmite 232Th record is variable, with several D-O events evident within stalagmite δ18O records not evident within the new dust record. This may reflect East Asian Summer Monsoon (EASM) moisture source region Sea Surface Temperature (SST) variability (affecting stalagmite δ18O) but stable westerly wind regime (resulting in invariant 232Th concentrations) or the fact that these events were too brief to trigger biome shifts. This study presents encouraging first results suggesting that stalagmite thorium concentrations partially reflect dust flux over cave sites. Although here we use a compilation of records, and the spread of data within each time slice is high, future studies at well-understood cave sites where thorium input to the cave is predominantly via dry deposition may require only single stalagmites to produce adequate absolutely dated dust reconstructions.