Bk. Linsley, OXYGEN-ISOTOPE RECORD OF SEA-LEVEL AND CLIMATE VARIATIONS IN THE SULU-SEA OVER THE PAST 150,000 YEARS, Nature, 380(6571), 1996, pp. 234-237
THE Sulu Sea is located in the 'warm pool' of the western Pacific Ocea
n, where mean annual temperatures are the highest of anywhere on Earth
. Because this large heat source supplies the atmosphere with a signif
icant portion of its water vapour and latent heat, understanding the c
limate history of the region is important for reconstructing global pa
laeoclimate and for predicting future climate change. Changes in the o
xygen isotope composition of planktonic foraminifera from Sulu Sea sed
iments have previously been shown to reflect changes in the planetary
ice volume at glacial-interglacial and millenial timescales, and such
records have been obtained for the late Pleistocene epoch and the last
deglaciation(1-3). Here I present results that extend the millenial t
ime resolution record back to 150,000 years before present. On timesca
les of around 10,000 years, the Sulu Sea oxygen-isotope record matches
changes in sea level deduced from coral terraces on the Huon peninsul
a(4). This is particularly the case during isotope stage 3 (an intergl
acial period 23,000 to 58,000 years ago) where the Sulu Sea oxygen-iso
tope record deviates from the SPECMAP deep-ocean oxygen-isotope record
(5). Thus these results support the ideal(4,6) that there were higher
sea levels and less continental ice during stage 3 than the SPECMAP re
cord implies and that sea level during this interglacial was just 40-5
0 metres below present levels, The subsequent rate of increase in cont
inental ice volume during the return to full glacial conditions was co
rrespondingly faster than previously thought.