Related Experiment Video
Updated: Jun 29, 2026

Surface Mapping of Earth-like Exoplanets using Single Point Light Curves
Published on: May 10, 2020
Strong coherence between solar variability and the monsoon in Oman between 9 and 6 kyr ago
1Heidelberg Academy of Sciences, Im Neuenheimer Feld 229, Heidelberg, Germany D-69120.
Abstract:
Variations in the amount of solar radiation reaching the Earth are thought to influence climate, but the extent of this influence on timescales of millennia to decades is unclear. A number of climate records show correlations between solar cycles and climate, but the absolute changes in solar intensity over the range of decades to millennia are small and the influence of solar flux on climate is not well established. The formation of stalagmites in northern Oman has recorded past northward shifts of the intertropical convergence zone, whose northward migration stops near the southern shoreline of Arabia in the present climate. Here we present a high-resolution record of oxygen isotope variations, for the period from 9.6 to 6.1 kyr before present, in a Th-U-dated stalagmite from Oman. The delta18O record from the stalagmite, which serves as a proxy for variations in the tropical circulation and monsoon rainfall, allows us to make a direct comparison of the delta18O record with the Delta14C record from tree rings, which largely reflects changes in solar activity. The excellent correlation between the two records suggests that one of the primary controls on centennial- to decadal-scale changes in tropical rainfall and monsoon intensity during this time are variations in solar radiation.
Related Concept Videos
Nuclear Fusion
A helium nucleus has a mass that is 0.7% less than that of four hydrogen nuclei; this lost mass is converted into energy during the fusion. This reaction produces about...
Synteny and Evolution
Around 80 million years ago, the human and mice lineages diverged from the common ancestor. During the course of evolution, the ancestral chromosome underwent...
Gravity between Spherical Bodies
This assumption can be proved easily by showing that the expression for gravitational potential energy between a hollow sphere of mass (M) and a point mass (m) is the same as it would be for a pair of extended...
Tidal Forces
Atomic Nuclei: Larmor Precession Frequency
Gravitation

