Changes in sea surface salinity in the South Atlantic during MIS 11 and Termination V

Abstract

Considering the scientifically and politically agreed-upon benchmark for global warminglimits (i.e. "well below 2°C"), Marine Isotope Stage 11 (MIS 11), which occurredbetween ca. 426 and 396 thousand year ago, is an excellent case study to investigate thebehavior of Earth's climate under globally 2°C warmer-than-preindustrial temperatures.The upper South Atlantic is particularly important for Earth's climate since it is anenormous heat and salt reservoir and comprises the route of warm and salty waterscoming from all oceanic basins towards the North Atlantic. However, the lack ofpaleoceanographic records with appropriate temporal resolution hampers theinvestigation of this warm and salty waters route during MIS 11 and its preceding glacialtermination (Termination V). Here, we propose to reconstruct South Atlantic sea surfacesalinities across MIS 11 and Termination V based on oxygen stable isotope (d18O)analyses performed in planktonic foraminiferal test coming from South Atlantic marinesediment cores.