Synchronous vegetation response to the last glacial-interglacial transition in northwest Europe
Authors
Engels, Stefan
Haliuc, Aritina
Hoek, Wim Z
Muschitiello, Francesco
Baneschi, Ilaria
Bouwman, Annerieke
Ramsey, Christopher Bronk
Collins, James
de Bruijn, Renee
Heiri, Oliver
Hubay, Katalin
Jones, Gwydion
Laug, Andreas
Merkt, Josef
Mueller, Meike
Peters, Tom
Peterse, Francien
Staff, Richard A
ter Schure, Anneke TM
Turner, Falko
van den Bos, Valerie
Wagner-Cremer, Frederike
Publication Date
2022-06-09Journal Title
COMMUNICATIONS EARTH & ENVIRONMENT
ISSN
2662-4435
Publisher
Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Volume
3
Issue
1
Language
en
Type
Article
This Version
VoR
Metadata
Show full item recordCitation
Engels, S., Lane, C., Haliuc, A., Hoek, W. Z., Muschitiello, F., Baneschi, I., Bouwman, A., et al. (2022). Synchronous vegetation response to the last glacial-interglacial transition in northwest Europe. COMMUNICATIONS EARTH & ENVIRONMENT, 3 (1) https://doi.org/10.1038/s43247-022-00457-y
Abstract
<jats:title>Abstract</jats:title><jats:p>The North Atlantic region experienced abrupt high-amplitude cooling at the onset of the Younger Dryas stadial. However, due to chronological uncertainties in the available terrestrial records it is unclear whether terrestrial ecosystem response to this event was instantaneous and spatially synchronous, or whether regional or time-transgressive lags existed. Here we use new palynological results from a robustly dated lake sediment sequence retrieved from lake Hämelsee (north Germany) to show that vegetation change started at 12,820 cal. yr BP, concurrent with the onset of changes in local climate. A comparison of the Hämelsee results to a compilation of precisely dated palynological records shows instant and, within decadal-scale dating uncertainty, synchronous response of the terrestrial plant community to Late-Glacial climate change across northwest Europe. The results indicate that the environmental impact of climate cooling was more severe than previously thought and illustrates the sensitivity of natural terrestrial ecosystems to external forcing.</jats:p>
Keywords
Article, /704/158/2462, /631/158/2165, article
Sponsorship
European Cooperation in Science and Technology (COST) (ES0907)
Identifiers
s43247-022-00457-y, 457
External DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s43247-022-00457-y
This record's URL: https://www.repository.cam.ac.uk/handle/1810/337947
Rights
Licence:
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
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