Borneo stalagmites provide view of abrupt climate events over 100,000 years

A new set of long-term climate records based on cave stalagmites collected from tropical Borneo shows that the western tropical Pacific responded very differently than other regions of the globe to abrupt climate change events. The 100,000-year climate record adds to data on past climate events, and may help scientists assess models designed to predict how Earth's climate will respond in the future.

The new record resulted from oxygen isotope analysis of more than 1,700 calcium carbonate samples taken from four stalagmites found in three different northern Borneo caves. The results suggest that climate feedbacks within the tropical regions may amplify and prolong abrupt climate change events that were first discovered in the North Atlantic.

The results were scheduled to be published June 6 in Science Express, the electronic advance online publication of the journal Science, and will appear later in an issue of printed publication. The research was supported by the National Science Foundation. [...] Georgia Institute of Technology via The Archaeology News Network