North Atlantic sediment records (MD95-2042), Greenland (Greenland Ice Core Project (GRIP)) and Antarctica (Byrd and Vostok) ice core climate records have been synchronized over marine isotopic stage 3 (MIS 3) (64 to 24 kyr B.P.) (Shackleton et al., 2000). The resulting common timescale suggested that MD95-2042 d18Obenthic fluctuations were synchronous with temperature changes in Antarctica (dDice or d18Oice records). In order to assess the persistency of this result we have used here the recent Greenland NorthGRIP ice core covering the last glacial inception. We transfer the Antarctic Vostok GT4 timescale to NorthGRIP d18Oice and MD95-2042 d18Oplanktonic records and precisely quantify all the relative timing uncertainties. During the rapid warming of Dansgaard-Oeschger 24, MD95-2042 d18Obenthic decrease is in phase with d18Oplanktonic decrease and therefore with NorthGRIP temperature increase, but it takes place 1700 ± 1100 years after the Antarctic warming. Thus the present study reveals that the results obtained previously for MIS 3 cannot be generalized and demonstrates the need to improve common chronologies for marine and polar archives.

Uncertainty associated with the d18Oatm Vostok GT4 tie points is mainly due to the smoothed shape and low resolution of the Vostok d18Oatm record making it difficult to clearly define midslopes, maxima and minima of the d18Oatm profile. The CH4 tie point (2944.7 m) is better defined: We associated the age at the midslope of the Vostok CH4 record (Caillon et al., 2003) with the depth of the rapid CH4 and d15N (i.e., temperature) increase recorded in NorthGRIP gas.

Supplement to: Landais, Amaëlle; Waelbroeck, Claire; Masson-Delmotte, Valerie (2006): On the limits of Antarctic and marine climate records synchronization: Lag estimates during marine isotopic stages 5d and 5c. Paleoceanography, 21(1), PA1001