the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
The Influence of Glacial Northern Hemisphere Ice Sheets On Atmospheric Circulation
Abstract. During the last glacial period, Northern Hemisphere (NH) ice sheets significantly influenced atmospheric circulation, yet their broader impacts beyond the North Atlantic remain underexplored. Using the Australian Earth System Model (ACCESS-ESM1.5), we simulate a glacial climate around 49,000 years ago (49 ka) during Marine Isotope Stage 3 (MIS 3, 65–25 ka), a period marked by prominent millennial-scale variability. Our findings demonstrate that the NH ice sheets induced a southward shift of the NH westerlies, increasing rainfall over Eurasia during boreal summer while reducing it in winter. The ice sheets' influence also extended across the tropics and the Southern Hemisphere (SH), driving a southward displacement of the Intertropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ) and the NH Hadley cell during austral summer, intensifying Australian rainfall. Additionally, including the Laurentide and Antarctic ice sheets (LIS and AIS) shifts the SH Hadley cell and the SH westerlies equatorward during JJA. These findings highlight the non-linear interactions between ice sheets, large-scale atmospheric circulation, and precipitation patterns.
Competing interests: At least one of the (co-)authors is a member of the editorial board of Climate of the Past.
Publisher's note: Copernicus Publications remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims made in the text, published maps, institutional affiliations, or any other geographical representation in this preprint. The responsibility to include appropriate place names lies with the authors.- Preprint
(21802 KB) - Metadata XML
- BibTeX
- EndNote
Status: open (until 10 Jul 2025)
- RC1: 'Comment on egusphere-2025-1990', Anonymous Referee #1, 16 Jun 2025 reply
Viewed
HTML | XML | Total | BibTeX | EndNote | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
204 | 36 | 8 | 248 | 7 | 11 |
- HTML: 204
- PDF: 36
- XML: 8
- Total: 248
- BibTeX: 7
- EndNote: 11
Viewed (geographical distribution)
Country | # | Views | % |
---|
Total: | 0 |
HTML: | 0 |
PDF: | 0 |
XML: | 0 |
- 1