Rapid coupling between solid earth and ice volume during the Quaternary
Yusuke Kuwahara, Kazutaka Yasukawa, Koichiro Fujinaga, Tatsuo Nozaki, Junichiro Ohta, Honami Sato, Jun‐Ichi Kimura, Kentaro Nakamura, Yūsuke Yokoyama, Yasuhiro Kato
Abstract
Abstract The solid earth plays a major role in controlling Earth’s surface climate. Volcanic degassing of carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) and silicate chemical weathering are known to regulate the evolution of climate on a geologic timescale (> 10 6 yr), but the relationship between the solid earth and the shorter (< 10 5 yr) fluctuations of Quaternary glacial–interglacial cycles is still under debate. Here we show that the seawater osmium isotope composition ( 187 Os/ 188 Os), a proxy for the solid earth’s response to climate change, has varied during the past 300,000 years in association with glacial–interglacial cycles. Our marine Os isotope mass-balance simulation reveals that the observed 187 Os/ 188 Os fluctuation cannot be explained solely by global chemical weathering rate changes corresponding to glacial–interglacial climate changes, but the fluctuation can be reproduced by taking account of short-term inputs of (1) radiogenic Os derived from intense weathering of glacial till during deglacial periods and (2) unradiogenic Os derived from enhanced seafloor hydrothermalism triggered by sea-level falls associated with increases of ice sheet volume. Our results constitute the first evidence that ice sheet recession and expansion during the Quaternary systematically and repetitively caused short-term (< 10 5 yr) solid earth responses via chemical weathering of glacial till and seafloor magmatism. This finding implies that climatic changes on < 10 5 yr timescales can provoke rapid feedbacks from the solid earth, a causal relationship that is the reverse of the longer-term (> 10 6 yr) causality that has been conventionally considered.