Atmospheric systems drive spatiotemporal divergence of dust and moisture changes across Asia over the past 130,000...

Loess-paleosol sequences across Asia provide a critical archive of past dust deposition and climate dynamics shaped by westerlies and Asian monsoons. We compile luminescence ages and climatic proxies from 107 loess sections to reconstruct dust mass accumulation rates (MARs) and hydroclimate variability over the past 130 thousand years (ka). The results reveal a consistent pattern: high MARs and low moisture during Marine Isotope Stages (MIS) 4 to 2 (71 to 12 ka) and low MARs with high moisture during MIS 5 (130 to 71 ka) and MIS 1 (12 ka to present). These shifts are driven by cooling-induced changes in atmospheric humidity linked to fluctuations in ice volume across glacial-interglacial cycles. Within MIS 5, MIS 4 to 2, and MIS 1, pronounced spatial and temporal contrasts in MARs and moisture emerge between westerlies-dominated northern Iran and central Asia and monsoon-dominated East Asia. Notably, westerly and monsoonal precipitation vary out of phase, driven by insolation-controlled shifts in moisture transport.