Decadal to centennial-scale climate variability during the Holocene and Late Glacial based on long CALYPSO cores off southern and subtropical Chile

• Applicant: Dr. Frank Lamy
• Subject Area: Palaeontology
• Term: from 2005 to 2011
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 5444670

The southern Chilean continental margin... offers unique opportunities to study Southern Hemisphere paleoenvironmental changes during the Holocene and the late glacial on short, decadal to centennial time-scales. We propose to recover 4 long CALYPSO piston cores from a latitudinal transect between 42 and 50°S and an additional core off subtropical Chile from the Bay of Mejillones at 23°S. The southern cores are expected to provide high resolution records of continental climate changes, particularly rainfall variability controlled by the southern westerly wind belt. Based on available data from short gravity cores on the continental slope between 40 and 44°S, sedimentationsrates should be high enough to record subcentennial scale variations. Further south, core locations in or near the Chilean fjords can be used to reconstruct Holocene and deglacial changes in the extent of the Patagonian ice-sheet. In addition, we plan to recover a long core from Bay of Mejillones where laminated sediments are reported from short cores. This subtropical region likely captures climate signals originating from the Tropical Pacific which will allow to compare high southern latitude and tropical influences on decadal to centennial-scale climate and ocean variability off Chile.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants
• Participating Persons: Professor Dr. Gerald Haug; Professor Dr. Dierk Hebbeln