Oscillators and relaxation phenomena in Pleistocene climate theory
Open Access
- 13 March 2012
- journal article
- review article
- Published by The Royal Society in Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society A: Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Sciences
- Vol. 370 (1962), 1140-1165
- https://doi.org/10.1098/rsta.2011.0315
Abstract
Ice sheets appeared in the northern hemisphere around 3 Ma (million years) ago and glacial–interglacial cycles have paced Earth's climate since then. Superimposed on these long glacial cycles comes an intricate pattern of millennial and sub-millennial variability, including Dansgaard–Oeschger and Heinrich events. There are numerous theories about these oscillations. Here, we review a number of them in order to draw a parallel between climatic concepts and dynamical system concepts, including, in particular, the relaxation oscillator, excitability, slow–fast dynamics and homoclinic orbits. Namely, almost all theories of ice ages reviewed here feature a phenomenon of synchronization between internal climate dynamics and astronomical forcing. However, these theories differ in their bifurcation structure and this has an effect on the way the ice age phenomenon could grow 3 Ma ago. All theories on rapid events reviewed here rely on the concept of a limit cycle excited by changes in the surface freshwater balance of the ocean. The article also reviews basic effects of stochastic fluctuations on these models, including the phenomenon of phase dispersion, shortening of the limit cycle and stochastic resonance. It concludes with a more personal statement about the potential for inference with simple stochastic dynamical systems in palaeoclimate science.Other Versions
This publication has 107 references indexed in Scilit:
- Northern Hemisphere glaciation and the evolution of Plio-Pleistocene climate noisePaleoceanography and Paleoclimatology, 2010
- Solar forced Dansgaard‐Oeschger events and their phase relation with solar proxiesGeophysical Research Letters, 2008
- Thermohaline circulation hysteresis: A model intercomparisonGeophysical Research Letters, 2005
- Relaxation oscillators in concert: A framework for climate change at millennial timescales during the late PleistoceneGeophysical Research Letters, 2002
- Physical mechanisms behind biogeochemical glacial‐interglacial CO2 variationsGeophysical Research Letters, 2001
- Sea ice as the glacial cycles’ Climate switch: role of seasonal and orbital forcingPaleoceanography and Paleoclimatology, 2000
- The timing of major climate terminationsPaleoceanography and Paleoclimatology, 1997
- Binge/purge oscillations of the Laurentide Ice Sheet as a cause of the North Atlantic's Heinrich eventsPaleoceanography and Paleoclimatology, 1993
- Patterns of Ice‐Rafted Detritus in the Glacial North Atlantic (40–55°N)Paleoceanography and Paleoclimatology, 1993
- Stochastic and chaotic relaxation oscillationsJournal of Statistical Physics, 1989