Stable isotope and Mg/Ca ratios of Paleogene benthic foraminifera in the western North Atlantic

DOI

Global cooling and the development of continental-scale Antarctic glaciation occurred in the late middle Eocene to early Oligocene (~38 to 28 million years ago), accompanied by deep-ocean reorganization attributed to gradual Antarctic Circumpolar Current (ACC) development. Our benthic foraminiferal stable isotope comparisons show that a large d13C offset developed between mid-depth (~600 meters) and deep (>1000 meters) western North Atlantic waters in the early Oligocene, indicating the development of intermediate-depth d13C and O2 minima closely linked in the modern ocean to northward incursion of Antarctic Intermediate Water. At the same time, the ocean's coldest waters became restricted to south of the ACC, probably forming a bottom-ocean layer, as in the modern ocean. We show that the modern four-layer ocean structure (surface, intermediate, deep, and bottom waters) developed during the early Oligocene as a consequence of the ACC.

Supplement to: Katz, Miriam E; Cramer, Benjamin S; Toggweiler, J Robbie; Esmay, Gar; Liu, Chengji; Miller, Kenneth G; Rosenthal, Yair; Wade, Bridget S; Wright, James D (2011): Impact of Antarctic Circumpolar Current development on late Paleogene ocean structure. Science, 332(6033), 1076-7079

Identifier
DOI https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.771562
Related Identifier https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1202122
Metadata Access https://ws.pangaea.de/oai/provider?verb=GetRecord&metadataPrefix=datacite4&identifier=oai:pangaea.de:doi:10.1594/PANGAEA.771562
Provenance
Creator Katz, Miriam E; Cramer, Benjamin S; Toggweiler, J Robbie; Esmay, Gar; Liu, Chengji; Miller, Kenneth G ORCID logo; Rosenthal, Yair ORCID logo; Wade, Bridget S ORCID logo; Wright, James D ORCID logo
Publisher PANGAEA
Publication Year 2011
Rights Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported; https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
OpenAccess true
Representation
Language English
Resource Type Supplementary Publication Series of Datasets; Collection
Format application/zip
Size 4 datasets
Discipline Earth System Research
Spatial Coverage (-77.250W, 29.992S, -76.524E, 33.133N); Carolina Slope, North Atlantic Ocean; North Atlantic
Temporal Coverage Begin 1997-02-06T00:00:00Z
Temporal Coverage End 1997-02-06T20:30:00Z