Links between climate and sea levels for the past three million years

Kurt Lambeck; Tezer M. Esat; Emma Kate Potter

doi:10.1038/nature01089

Links between climate and sea levels for the past three million years

Kurt Lambeck, Tezer M. Esat, Emma Kate Potter

Research output: Contribution to journal › Review article › peer-review

735 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

The oscillations between glacial and interglacial climate conditions over the past three million years have been characterized by a transfer of immense amounts of water between two of its largest reservoirs on Earth - the ice sheets and the oceans. Since the latest of these oscillations, the Last Glacial Maximum (between about 30,000 and 19,000 years ago), ∼50 million cubic kilometres of ice has melted from the land-based ice sheets, raising global sea level by ∼130 metres. Such rapid changes in sea level are part of a complex pattern of interactions between the atmosphere, oceans, ice sheets and solid earth, all of which have different response timescales. The trigger for the sea-level fluctuations most probably lies with changes in insolation, caused by astronomical forcing, but internal feedback cycles complicate the simple model of causes and effects.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	199-206
Number of pages	8
Journal	Nature
Volume	419
Issue number	6903
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1038/nature01089
Publication status	Published - 12 Sept 2002

Access to Document

10.1038/nature01089

Cite this

@article{eaf6fcc9612b45a390863377b5febf04,

title = "Links between climate and sea levels for the past three million years",

abstract = "The oscillations between glacial and interglacial climate conditions over the past three million years have been characterized by a transfer of immense amounts of water between two of its largest reservoirs on Earth - the ice sheets and the oceans. Since the latest of these oscillations, the Last Glacial Maximum (between about 30,000 and 19,000 years ago), ∼50 million cubic kilometres of ice has melted from the land-based ice sheets, raising global sea level by ∼130 metres. Such rapid changes in sea level are part of a complex pattern of interactions between the atmosphere, oceans, ice sheets and solid earth, all of which have different response timescales. The trigger for the sea-level fluctuations most probably lies with changes in insolation, caused by astronomical forcing, but internal feedback cycles complicate the simple model of causes and effects.",

author = "Kurt Lambeck and Esat, {Tezer M.} and Potter, {Emma Kate}",

year = "2002",

month = sep,

day = "12",

doi = "10.1038/nature01089",

language = "English",

volume = "419",

pages = "199--206",

journal = "Nature",

issn = "0028-0836",

publisher = "Nature Publishing Group",

number = "6903",

}

TY - JOUR

T1 - Links between climate and sea levels for the past three million years

AU - Lambeck, Kurt

AU - Esat, Tezer M.

AU - Potter, Emma Kate

PY - 2002/9/12

Y1 - 2002/9/12

N2 - The oscillations between glacial and interglacial climate conditions over the past three million years have been characterized by a transfer of immense amounts of water between two of its largest reservoirs on Earth - the ice sheets and the oceans. Since the latest of these oscillations, the Last Glacial Maximum (between about 30,000 and 19,000 years ago), ∼50 million cubic kilometres of ice has melted from the land-based ice sheets, raising global sea level by ∼130 metres. Such rapid changes in sea level are part of a complex pattern of interactions between the atmosphere, oceans, ice sheets and solid earth, all of which have different response timescales. The trigger for the sea-level fluctuations most probably lies with changes in insolation, caused by astronomical forcing, but internal feedback cycles complicate the simple model of causes and effects.

AB - The oscillations between glacial and interglacial climate conditions over the past three million years have been characterized by a transfer of immense amounts of water between two of its largest reservoirs on Earth - the ice sheets and the oceans. Since the latest of these oscillations, the Last Glacial Maximum (between about 30,000 and 19,000 years ago), ∼50 million cubic kilometres of ice has melted from the land-based ice sheets, raising global sea level by ∼130 metres. Such rapid changes in sea level are part of a complex pattern of interactions between the atmosphere, oceans, ice sheets and solid earth, all of which have different response timescales. The trigger for the sea-level fluctuations most probably lies with changes in insolation, caused by astronomical forcing, but internal feedback cycles complicate the simple model of causes and effects.

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=0037068495&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1038/nature01089

DO - 10.1038/nature01089

M3 - Review article

SN - 0028-0836

VL - 419

SP - 199

EP - 206

JO - Nature

JF - Nature

IS - 6903

ER -

Links between climate and sea levels for the past three million years

Abstract

Access to Document

Other files and links

Fingerprint

Cite this