0000000000136817
AUTHOR
A. Wackerbarth
Bunker Cave stalagmites: an archive for central European Holocene climate variability
Holocene climate was characterised by variability on multi-centennial to multi-decadal time scales. In central Europe, these fluctuations were most pronounced during winter. Here we present a record of past winter climate variability for the last 10.8 ka based on four speleothems from Bunker Cave, western Germany. Due to its central European location, the cave site is particularly well suited to record changes in precipitation and temperature in response to changes in the North Atlantic realm. We present high-resolution records of &delta;<sup>18</sup>O, &delta;<sup>13</sup>C values and Mg/Ca ratios. Changes in the Mg/Ca ratio are attributed to past meteoric p…
Modelling the δ18O value of cave drip water and speleothem calcite
Abstract Stable isotope signals recorded in speleothems have provided important insights about past climate variability in recent years. Quantitative reconstruction of mean annual temperature and the amount of precipitation, however, remains difficult because the stable isotope signals are influenced by various processes. Here we present a drip water model, which shows how these climate parameters affect the oxygen isotope signal of cave drip water. In the model the dependence of the δ 18 O value of drip water on mean annual temperature is established by correlation to the amount of winter precipitation and winter temperature. Application of the model to two caves in western Germany reveals…
Reconstruction of drip-water δ&lt;sup&gt;18&lt;/sup&gt;O based on calcite oxygen and clumped isotopes of speleothems from Bunker Cave (Germany)
Abstract. The geochemical signature of many speleothems used for reconstruction of past continental climates is affected by kinetic isotope fractionation. This limits quantitative paleoclimate reconstruction and, in cases where the kinetic fractionation varies with time, also affects relative paleoclimate interpretations. In carbonate archive research, clumped isotope thermometry is typically used as proxy for absolute temperatures. In the case of speleothems, however, clumped isotopes provide a sensitive indicator for disequilibrium effects. The extent of kinetic fractionation co-varies in Δ47 and δ18O so that it can be used to account for disequilibrium in δ18O and to extract the past dri…
Simulated European stalagmite record and its relation to a quasi-decadal climate mode
Abstract. A synthetic stalagmite record for the Bunker cave is constructed using a combined climate-stalagmite modeling approach. The power spectrum of the simulated speleothem calcite δ18O record has a pronounced peak at quasi-decadal time scale. Interestingly, mixing processes in the soil and karst above the cave represent a natural low-pass filter of the speleothem climate archive. We identify a quasi-decadal mode characterized by a "tripole pattern" of sea surface temperature affecting stalagmite δ18O values. This pattern, which is well-known in literature as the quasi-decadal mode in the North Atlantic, propagates eastwards and affects western European temperature surrounding the cave.…