Identification

Title

Rapid 20th century warming reverses 900-year cooling in the Gulf of Maine

Abstract

The Gulf of Maine, located in the western North Atlantic, has undergone recent, rapid ocean warming but the lack of long-term, instrumental records hampers the ability to put these significant hydrographic changes into context. Here we present multiple 300-year long geochemical records (oxygen, nitrogen, and previously published radiocarbon isotopes) measured in absolutely-dated Arctica islandica shells from the western Gulf of Maine. These records, in combination with climate model simulations, suggest that the Gulf of Maine underwent a long-term cooling over most of the last 1000 years, driven primarily by volcanic forcing and North Atlantic ocean dynamics. This cooling trend was reversed by warming beginning in the late 1800s, likely due to increased atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations and changes in western North Atlantic circulation. The climate model simulations suggest that the warming over the last century was more rapid than almost any other 100-year period in the last 1000 years in the region.

Resource type

document

Resource locator

Unique resource identifier

code

http://n2t.net/ark:/85065/d7t43xwx

codeSpace

Dataset language

eng

Spatial reference system

code identifying the spatial reference system

Classification of spatial data and services

Topic category

geoscientificInformation

Keywords

Keyword set

keyword value

Text

originating controlled vocabulary

title

Resource Type

reference date

date type

publication

effective date

2016-01-01T00:00:00Z

Geographic location

West bounding longitude

East bounding longitude

North bounding latitude

South bounding latitude

Temporal reference

Temporal extent

Begin position

End position

Dataset reference date

date type

publication

effective date

2022-08-08T00:00:00Z

Frequency of update

Quality and validity

Lineage

Conformity

Data format

name of format

version of format

Constraints related to access and use

Constraint set

Use constraints

Limitations on public access

None

Responsible organisations

Responsible party

contact position

OpenSky Support

organisation name

UCAR/NCAR - Library

full postal address

PO Box 3000

Boulder

80307-3000

email address

opensky@ucar.edu

web address

http://opensky.ucar.edu/

name: homepage

responsible party role

pointOfContact

Metadata on metadata

Metadata point of contact