Using geological samples from the Ythan Estuary in Scotland, scientists have identified a melting ice sheet as the probable trigger of a major climate-change event just over 8,000 years ago.
And the analysis—involving a team of geo-scientists from four Yorkshire universities led by Dr. Graham Rush, who holds positions at both the University of Leeds and Leeds Beckett University—could hold clues as to how present-day ice loss in Greenland could affect the world’s climate systems.
More than 8,000 years ago, the North Atlantic and Northern Europe experienced significant cooling because of changes to a major system of ocean currents known as the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation, or AMOC.
The change in AMOC also affected global rainfall patterns.
It is believed that an influx of a massive amount of freshwater into the salt-water seas of the North Atlantic caused the AMOC to breakdown.
2023-09-15 07:00:04
Source from phys.org