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Indian summer monsoon variability during the Holocene as recorded in sediments of the Arabian Sea: Timing and implications

DRS at CSIR-National Institute of Oceanography

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Title Indian summer monsoon variability during the Holocene as recorded in sediments of the Arabian Sea: Timing and implications
 
Creator Thamban, M.
Kawahata, H.
Rao, V.P.
 
Subject palaeo studies
summer
monsoons
seasonal variations
holocene
sediments
climatic changes
oxygen minimum layer
atmospheric precipitation
solar power
 
Description Indian monsoon precipitation fluctuated significantly during the Holocene and a reliable reconstruction of the timing of the events and their implications is of great benefit to our understanding of the effect and response of low latitude climate systems to the forcing factors. High-resolution terrigenous proxy studies on a laminated sediment core from the Oxygen Minimum Zone of the eastern Arabian Sea margin is carried out to reconstruct the summer monsoon-controlled precipitation changes during the Holocene. The temporal variation in the terrigenous proxy indicators of this core, in combination with other high-quality cores from the Arabian Sea, suggests several abrupt events in monsoon precipitation throughout the Holocene. The early Holocene monsoon intensification occurred in two abrupt steps at 9500 and 9100 years BP and weakened gradually thereafter, starting at 8500 years BP. A weakening in precipitation recorded at approx. 7000 years BP, synchronous with similar conditions in India. One of the most significant weak monsoon periods recorded in our studies lies between 6000 and 5500 years BP. Spectral analysis of the precipitation records reveals statistically significant periodicities at 2200, 1350, 950, 750, 470, 320, 220, 156, 126, 113, 104 and 92 years. Most of these millennial-to-centennial cycles exist in various monsoon records as well as the tree ring delta sup(14) C data and/or other solar proxy records. It is suggested that throughout the Holocene, externally, small changes in solar activity controlled the Indian monsoon to a large extent, whereas internally, non-solar causes could have influenced the amplitude of decadal-to-centennial oscillations.
 
Date 2008-01-31T07:07:13Z
2008-01-31T07:07:13Z
2007
 
Type Journal Article
 
Identifier Journal of Oceanography, Vol.63; 1009-1020p.
http://drs.nio.org/drs/handle/2264/722
 
Language en
 
Publisher TERRAPUB