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Natural Variability of the Arctic Ocean Sea Ice During the Present Interglacial

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Natural variability of the Arctic Ocean sea ice during the present interglacial Anne de Vernala,1, Claude Hillaire-Marcela, Cynthia Le Duca, Philippe Robergea, Camille Bricea, Jens Matthiessenb, Robert F. Spielhagenc, and Ruediger Steinb,d aGeotop-Université du Québec à Montréal, Montréal, QC H3C 3P8, Canada; bGeosciences/Marine Geology, Alfred Wegener Institute Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research, 27568 Bremerhaven, Germany; cOcean Circulation and Climate Dynamics Division, GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research, 24148 Kiel, Germany; and dMARUM Center for Marine Environmental Sciences and Faculty of Geosciences, University of Bremen, 28334 Bremen, Germany Edited by Thomas M. Cronin, U.S. Geological Survey, Reston, VA, and accepted by Editorial Board Member Jean Jouzel August 26, 2020 (received for review May 6, 2020) The impact of the ongoing anthropogenic warming on the Arctic such an extrapolation. Moreover, the past 1,400 y only encom- Ocean sea ice is ascertained and closely monitored. However, its pass a small fraction of the climate variations that occurred long-term fate remains an open question as its natural variability during the Cenozoic (7, 8), even during the present interglacial, on centennial to millennial timescales is not well documented. i.e., the Holocene (9), which began ∼11,700 y ago. To assess Here, we use marine sedimentary records to reconstruct Arctic Arctic sea-ice instabilities further back in time, the analyses of sea-ice fluctuations. Cores collected along the Lomonosov Ridge sedimentary archives is required but represents a challenge (10, that extends across the Arctic Ocean from northern Greenland to 11). Suitable sedimentary sequences with a reliable chronology the Laptev Sea were radiocarbon dated and analyzed for their and biogenic content allowing oceanographical reconstructions micropaleontological and palynological contents, both bearing in- can be recovered from Arctic Ocean shelves, but they rarely formation on the past sea-ice cover. Results demonstrate that mul- encompass more than the past 10,000 y because they remained tiyear pack ice remained a robust feature of the western and emerged and subject to glacial erosion during most of the past central Lomonosov Ridge and that perennial sea ice remained pre- ice age. Sedimentary records can be obtained from deeper set- sent throughout the present interglacial, even during the climate tings in the central Arctic Ocean, but their chronology is optimum of the middle Holocene that globally peaked ∼6,500 y equivocal due to: i) highly variable but overly low accumulation EARTH, ATMOSPHERIC, AND PLANETARY SCIENCES ago. In contradistinction, the southeastern Lomonosov Ridge area rates, ii) the rarity of biogenic remains that can be dated, ensuing experienced seasonally sea-ice-free conditions, at least, sporadi- from low primary productivity, and iii) the blurred foraminifera cally, until about 4,000 y ago. They were marked by relatively high 18O records preventing the setting of an oxygen isotope stratig- phytoplanktonic productivity and organic carbon fluxes at the sea- raphy (12–14). Consequently, most studies of the central Arctic floor resulting in low biogenic carbonate preservation. These re- sedimentary records only led to very speculative conclusions. – sults point to contrasted west east surface ocean conditions in the Data sets from sediment cores documenting the sea-ice cover Arctic Ocean, not unlike those of the Arctic dipole linked to the in the circum-Arctic and spanning, at least, the middle-to-late recent loss of Arctic sea ice. Hence, our data suggest that season- Holocene, are available for the Beaufort, Chukchi, East Siberian, ally ice-free conditions in the southeastern Arctic Ocean with a Laptev, and Kara seas (15–21). They indicate an overall dense dominant Arctic dipolar pattern, may be a recurrent feature under sea-ice cover with temporal changes in concentration or seasonal “warm world” climate. Arctic | sea ice | Holocene | climate | ocean Significance Arctic sea ice is an important component of the Earth’s climate he Arctic Ocean is often considered the last frontier of the system, but prior to its recent reduction, its long-term natural Earth, mostly due to its difficult access for observation and T instabilities need to be better documented. In this study, in- monitoring. Fortunately, recent satellite data provide critical formation on past sea-ice conditions across the Arctic Ocean information on its high-frequency sensitivity allowing to docu- demonstrates that whereas its western and central parts ment its role in the climate system through the so-called “Arctic remained occupied by perennial sea ice throughout the present amplification” (1) and on extreme weather conditions at mid- interglacial, its southeastern sector close to the Russian margin latitudes through teleconnection linkages (2–4). This current experienced, at least, sporadic seasonal sea-ice-free conditions knowledge of the Arctic sea-ice dynamics and decline is based on during the warmer part of the present interglacial until about 40 y of satellite observation, an interval insufficient to ∼4,000 y ago. Sea-ice-free conditions during summer in the document the full range of its natural variability and to fully southeastern Arctic Ocean seem, therefore, to be a recurrent assess feedbacks on the global ocean, climate, and ecosystems. feature linked to its natural variability during warm episodes The documenting of Arctic sea-ice variability, especially with of the past. respect to low-frequency secular to millennial scale forcings and feedbacks, is still required to fully assess the effective role of Author contributions: A.d.V. and C.H.-M. designed research; A.d.V., C.L.D., P.R., C.B., J.M., anthropogenic versus natural forcing in its near future fate (5). R.F.S., and R.S. performed research; A.d.V., R.F.S., and R.S. analyzed data; and A.d.V. and Here, the examination of long-term paleoclimate archives is es- C.H.-M. wrote the paper. sential. The compilation of annually resolved climate data, such The authors declare no competing interest. as tree-ring and ice core records from the circumArctic led to This article is a PNAS Direct Submission. T.M.C. is a guest editor invited by the suggest that the decline in the sea-ice cover over the past decades Editorial Board. is unprecedented, at least, for the past 1,400 y (6). Adding the This open access article is distributed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial- recent observational records, it is tempting to hypothesize an NoDerivatives License 4.0 (CC BY-NC-ND). exclusive relationship between the sea-ice decline and the on- 1To whom correspondence may be addressed. Email: [email protected]. going global warming and to predict a fast and complete disap- This article contains supporting information online at https://www.pnas.org/lookup/suppl/ pearance of perennial sea ice in the Arctic Ocean. However, doi:10.1073/pnas.2008996117/-/DCSupplemental. linkages among climate, ocean, and sea ice are too complex for First published October 5, 2020. www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.2008996117 PNAS | October 20, 2020 | vol. 117 | no. 42 | 26069–26075 Downloaded by guest on September 30, 2021 extent. Data from cores collected in the surrounding subarctic of calcareous microfauna is moderate at the surface of the sed- seas of the North Atlantic, in particular, the Greenland, Nor- iment and decreases rapidly a few centimeters below the surface wegian, and Barents seas, as well as the Baffin Bay also show layer, resulting in a fast decrease in foraminifer concentrations relatively large amplitude variations in their winter and spring downcore (Figs. 2 and 3A). This unfortunately hampers the sea-ice cover but mostly illustrate an increasing trend from the setting of 14C chronologies from their dating. Second, the few thermal optimum of the early–middle Holocene characterized by 14C ages, obtained in the upper part of the cores, suggest rela- low sea-ice cover, toward the neoglacial high sea-ice cover of the tively high sedimentation rates, at least, during the middle-to- very late Holocene (16, 22–28). Hence, the information available late Holocene interval (>3 cm per thousands of years). Third, for the present interglacial relates mostly to the Arctic shelves organic-walled microfossils which relate to phototrophic pro- and subarctic seas. It illustrates changes in the position of the ductivity are present (Fig. 3 A and B)withassemblageslargely sea-ice edge with asynchronous minima around the Arctic. Close dominated by Operculodinium centrocarpum (Dataset S4), which to the Arctic gateways, regional discrepancies with respect to the is the cyst of a phototrophic dinoflagellate species (35). Hence, sea-ice distribution point to an important role of exchanges in the southeastern sector of the Lomonosov Ridge, close to the through the Fram Strait as well as through the Barents Sea and Laptev Sea, the biological content and relatively high accumu- Bering Strait, following their early-to-middle Holocene sub- lation rate of sedimentary sequences attest to a significant pri- mergences, respectively. Nonetheless, uncertainties in the re- mary productivity with seasonal sea-ice openings and regrowths. construction of the sea-ice cover from proxy data as well as the Together, these features point to the occurrence of a first-year low spatial coverage of the existing records prevent the setting of ice environment, which is favorable to: i) high fluxes of particles a comprehensive picture of Holocene sea-ice cover variability. uploaded by sea ice, delivered later on during its seasonal melt Moreover, the lack of information from the central Arctic Ocean (34, 36), ii) primary production at the sea-ice edge with ice-free area where dramatic low sea-ice cover was recorded in 2007, environments in summer (37), and iii) enhanced atmospheric 2012, and 2019 (e.g., refs. 29 and 30), constitutes an important CO2 uptake rate in the upper ocean and further entrainment and critical unknown about the long-term low-frequency Arctic from surface to deep ocean with brines during the annual sea-ice pack-ice dynamics.
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