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Updated: Jul 23, 2026

Ice Generation and the Heat and Mass Transfer Phenomena of Introducing Water to a Cold Bath of Brine
Published on: March 13, 2017
Pore Fluid Constraints on the Temperature and Oxygen Isotopic Composition of the Glacial Ocean
1D. P. Schrag, Department of Geological and Geophysical Sciences, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ 08544-1003, USA. G. Hampt, Institute of Marine Sciences, University of California, Santa Cruz, CA 95064, USA. D. W. Murray, Department of Geological Sciences, Brown University, Providence, RI 02912, USA.
Abstract:
Pore fluids from the upper 60 meters of sediment 3000 meters below the surface of the tropical Atlantic indicate that the oxygen isotopic composition (delta18O) of seawater at this site during the last glacial maximum was 0.8 ± 0.1 per mil higher than it is today. Combined with the delta18O change in benthic foraminifera from this region, the elevated ratio indicates that the temperature of deep water in the tropical Atlantic Ocean was 4°C colder during the last glacial maximum. Extrapolation from this site to a global average suggests that the ice volume contribution to the change in delta18O of foraminifera is 1.0 per mil, which partially reconciles the foraminiferal oxygen isotope record of tropical sea surface temperatures with estimates from Barbados corals and terrestrial climate proxies.
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