RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Extensive marine-terminating ice sheets in Europe from 2.5 million years ago
JF Science Advances
JO Sci Adv
FD American Association for the Advancement of Science
SP eaar8327
DO 10.1126/sciadv.aar8327
VO 4
IS 6
A1 Rea, Brice R.
A1 Newton, Andrew M. W.
A1 Lamb, Rachel M.
A1 Harding, Rachel
A1 Bigg, Grant R.
A1 Rose, Phil
A1 Spagnolo, Matteo
A1 Huuse, Mads
A1 Cater, John M. L.
A1 Archer, Stuart
A1 Buckley, Francis
A1 Halliyeva, Maral
A1 Huuse, Jane
A1 Cornwell, David G.
A1 Brocklehurst, Simon H.
A1 Howell, John A.
YR 2018
UL http://advances.sciencemag.org/content/4/6/eaar8327.abstract
AB Geometries of Early Pleistocene [2.58 to 0.78 million years (Ma) ago] ice sheets in northwest Europe are poorly constrained but are required to improve our understanding of past ocean-atmosphere-cryosphere coupling. Ice sheets are believed to have changed in their response to orbital forcing, becoming, from about 1.2 Ma ago, volumetrically larger and longer-lived. We present a multiproxy data set for the North Sea, extending to over a kilometer below the present-day seafloor, which demonstrates spatially extensive glaciation of the basin from the earliest Pleistocene. Ice sheets repeatedly entered the North Sea, south of 60°N, in water depths of up to ~250 m from 2.53 Ma ago and subsequently grounded in the center of the basin, in deeper water, from 1.87 Ma ago. Despite lower global ice volumes, these ice sheets were near comparable in spatial extent to those of the Middle and Late Pleistocene but possibly thinner and moving over slippery (low basal resistance) beds.