21. Abrupt change of El Niño activity off Peru during stage MIS 5e-d

2007

Abstract High-resolution proxy data for El Nino variability during the last glacial cycle were derived from a laminated marine sediment core from a region whose climatology and oceanography is strongly affected by ENSO variability. The proxies used are the seasurface temperature and the lithic flux from the continent onto the continental shelf that is largely controlled by the river flood discharge after strong El Nino rainfall in northern and northern central Peru. The focus of this paper is on an abrupt, possibly orbitally driven change of El Nino activity within marine isotope stage 5e. A similar sharp decline of El Nino activity is also observed during the middle of the Holocene intergl…